Labour will use the first day of its annual conference in Liverpool to announce plans to build 12 new towns across England in a bid to tackle the housing crisis, with three projects scheduled to begin before the next general election.
Housing secretary Steve Reed will confirm the initiative during his speech on Sunday, unveiling the first major programme of new towns since the post-war era.
A task force has recommended 12 locations for development, ranging from standalone communities on greenfield land to inner-city regeneration schemes.
Reed will say the towns represent “the next generation of cutting-edge communities”, echoing Clement Attlee’s post-war housing drive.
The Government has promised that each settlement will include at least 10,000 homes, supported by GP surgeries, schools, green space and transport links. The taskforce has recommended that 40 per cent of the homes be classed as affordable, with a fifth reserved for social housing.
The three priority sites are Tempsford in Bedfordshire, Leeds South Bank and Crews Hill in north London. The Government said construction on these towns will begin within the current parliament.
Tempsford, a village of 600 people with around 300 houses, has been earmarked as a potential hub on the Oxford–Cambridge growth corridor.
However, its parish council chairman, David Sutton, said residents had been “kept in the dark” about the scale of the plans.
“Even today, as an announcement’s being made, we’ve been given no idea whatsoever of the scale of what we’re being asked to live amongst,” he told the PA news agency. “Nobody’s come to talk to us at all.”
Leeds South Bank is already part of a significant regeneration scheme that aims to double the size of the city centre.
Similarly, Crews Hill in Enfield, around 12 miles from the centre of London, is already the subject of a draft local plan which proposes building around 5,500 homes on green belt and grey belt land.
Alongside these three, nine further sites have been recommended for development.
In Cheshire East, a new standalone settlement has been identified at Adlington, a small village of around 1,200 residents.
South Gloucestershire would see a corridor of linked development north of Bristol, adding thousands of homes in areas such as Cribbs and Yate.
The former RAF Upper Heyford airbase in Cherwell, Oxfordshire, is already subject to plans to be redeveloped into a mixed-use community with upgraded transport links, which Labour’s plan is set to expand on.
Manchester’s Victoria North project is already one of the country’s largest regeneration schemes, with plans for 15,000 homes and a new City River Park.
In east Devon, a site near Exeter known as Marlcombe has been selected as the location for a new town.
Plymouth would see densification around its historic waterfront, while Milton Keynes has been earmarked as a renewed town with large-scale estate regeneration.
Further plans include major expansion around Worcestershire Parkway, where up to 10,000 homes could be delivered alongside a new town centre, and a riverside redevelopment in Thamesmead, south-east London.
Reed will tell delegates that the project is designed to “restore the dream of home ownership” for families priced out of the market.
“This party built new towns after the war to meet our promise of homes fit for heroes. Now, with the worst economic inheritance since that war, we will once again build cutting-edge communities to provide homes fit for families of all shapes and sizes,” he is expected to say.
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Prime Minister Keir Starmer will also frame the plan as central to Labour’s growth strategy. “For so many families, homeownership is a distant dream,” he said ahead of the conference. “My Labour government will sweep aside the blockers to get homes built, building the next generation of new towns.”
The announcement comes as Labour faces mounting pressure over housing delivery. Planning approvals for new homes in England fell to a record low during the Government’s first year in office, and industry leaders have warned that rising costs and higher taxes could limit the pace of construction.
Labour has set a target of 1.5m homes by 2029, but analysts have cast doubt on whether this figure is achievable. Academics estimate the country faces a shortfall of around 4.3m homes, with record numbers of people in temporary accommodation.
The New Towns Taskforce, established last September, has recommended that development corporations be set up to deliver the projects.
These bodies would have powers to purchase land compulsorily, grant planning permission and invest in local services, mirroring the model used to redevelop Stratford in east London ahead of the 2012 Olympics.
Final decisions on funding and the precise boundaries of the sites will be confirmed next spring, following environmental assessments and public engagement.
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