Flawed housebuilding figures exclude a fifth of completions

September 19, 2016 / Isla MacFarlane
Flawed housebuilding figures exclude a fifth of completions

The Government’s most publicised measure of housebuilding excludes around a fifth of all new build completions every year, according to a report released by the Home Builders’ Federation (HBF).

According to the report, aptly name ‘Ghost Towns’, flawed methodology and poor returns from Local Authorities mean around 30,000 new builds are not counted in the official numbers.

Analysis shows that the ill-termed ‘House Building Statistics’, released on a quarterly and annual basis by the Department of Communities and Local Government (DCLG) underreport new build completions in 75% of Local Authorities with an average of 153 new homes ‘lost’ in each of those areas.

More than half of new build homes in areas such as Birmingham, Liverpool, Leicester, Salford and many London Boroughs are completely unaccounted for in the quarterly series. As a result, a town equivalent to the size of Stevenage is being ‘lost’ every year, or, over the course of a Parliament, in which Government is targeting a million homes, a city larger than Nottingham, Coventry or Newcastle simply vanishes.

The confusingly named ‘Net Supply of Housing ‘data series, which is only published once a year and is drawn from more reliable sources more closely linked to the numbers Local Authorities use for determining their Council Tax Base show that more than 181,000 homes were added to the housing stock in 2014/15 – the last numbers available – of which 155,000 were new build, up 20% year on year.

“Housebuilding has increased significantly in recent years but the continual publication and use of inaccurate statistics is painting a negative picture that is undermining the progress being made in tackling the housing shortage,” said Stewart Baseley, executive chairman of the Home Builders Federation. “The Government’s housing policies and the industry are delivering, and it is incredibly frustrating that official statistics are not reflecting what is happening on the ground but instead presenting an open goal for critics.”

The published data excluded:

  • At least 75% the London Boroughs of Brent, Wandsworth, Hammersmith and Fulham and Kensington & Chelsea,
  • 1,280 new homes in Birmingham (two-thirds of all new build completions)
  • 920 new homes in Liverpool (63% of all new build completions)
  • 640 new homes in Salford (half of all new build completions)
  • 570 new homes in Leicester (6 out of 10 new build completions)
  • 570 new homes in Sheffield (40% of all new build completions)
  • 400 new homes in Chester West & Chester (29% of all new build completions)

The report also puts forward additional reliable indicators of housing delivery, including the official Council Tax Base statistics, counting net additional homes at a later point in the year than that covered by the Net Supply statistics, and the issuance of Energy Performance Certificates for new build properties.

According to the HBF, Both report that construction levels vastly outstripping the wildly inaccurate ‘House Building Statistics’.

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