Election victory clears the way for changes that will make life easier for developers
: Gareth Fuller/PA
Shares in Britain’s biggest housebuilders jumped on Thursday amid hopes Labour’s plan to ramp up construction on the green belt will deliver a boost to the industry.
The party’s landslide election victory has cleared the way for a raft of changes that will make life easier for developers, City analysts have predicted.
Optimism across the sector led to shares in Barratt, Britain’s biggest house builder by volume, surging 1.2pc, while shares in rivals Persimmon and Taylor Wimpey rose by 2pc and 1.4pc respectively.
In a note to clients on Friday morning, analysts at Investec said they expected Sir Keir Starmer to pursue “some quick wins” before turning to bigger changes that will help him deliver a promise to build 1.5 million new homes.
This is initially expected to mean reinstating local authority housing targets and rules that strengthen “the presumption in favour of sustainable development”, Investec’s Aynsley Lammin and Lewis Roxburgh said.
They added: “This should result in a short-term easing of the planning system to support supply.
“Beyond this, but likely to prove trickier and take more time, we would expect more structural reform of planning, such as taking a more ‘strategic approach’ to the greenbelt.
“We also expect a concerted effort to increase the provision of social and affordable housing.”
In its election manifesto, Labour promised to build 1.5 million homes in England and Wales over the next parliament – equivalent to about 300,000 homes a year.
As part of this, the party vowed to overhaul planning rules and release what Mr Starmer and Rachel Reeves, his soon-to-be Chancellor, have described as low-quality “grey belt” land from the green belt.
Labour also set out plans to build a generation of new towns or extensions to major cities where there are housing shortages.
Meanwhile, local authorities will be given powers to ensure local first-time buyers are prioritised for new homes. A mortgage guarantee scheme to help them with deposits will also be introduced.
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