Background
To provide land for housebuilding in England, the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) supports the ‘unlocking’ of land the market deems unviable or difficult to develop. This is primarily achieved through programmes delivered via Homes England, the government’s housing and regeneration agency. These programmes include interventions like acquiring and assembling land held by different owners, taking on the financial risk of decontaminating and remediating brownfield sites, and providing the infrastructure needed to support development.
Working largely through Homes England, MHCLG reported unlocking land in 2024-25 capable of delivering 79,000 homes. Across the last five years the total is 347,000 potential homes.
Scope
Our report will examine whether MHCLG’s approach to unlocking land is effectively supporting government’s ambitions to build the right homes in the right places. We aim to look at performance to date, what learning and innovating has happened and how MHCLG and Homes England are set up to deliver into the future. We will assess:
- whether MHCLG has unlocked land in the right places to deliver the types of homes which are most needed.
- how MHCLG is improving the productivity of its land unlocking programmes.
- how MHCLG and Homes England are planning to unlock the right land in the right places to support future housing targets.
NAO team
Director: Helen Hodgson
Audit Manager: Philip Taylor