The government promised to build 1.5 million new homes over the course of this parliament. How close are they to reaching the annualised rate? We don’t yet have government statistics to cover the whole of Labour’s first year in office, yet in the year to March construction began on just 138,650 new homes across the UK. In other words, housebuilding is running at substantially less than half the rate needed for the government to meet its promise. In fact, construction is slowing compared with where it was under the Conservatives.

A report by the House Builders’ Federation (HBF) on construction in London explains some of the reasons why. In London, the supply of new homes is running even further behind the government’s schedule than in other parts of the country. Over the course of this parliament, 444,000 new homes are supposed to be built in London – 88,800 per year. But in the year to June the HBF estimates........

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