DESPITE his blokey, down-to-Earth manner, there’s little doubt Prime Minister Burnham will lead a New Labour continuity government. However, there is one area where there may be genuine hope for a change of direction — housing. In fact, Burnham’s political fate depends on it.

Just as it would be a mistake to over-estimate the potential of the Burnham administration, it would be an equal one to fail to recognise the significance of what he’s saying about housing. He has stated, repeatedly, that he intends to oversee a council house building programme of a scale not seen since the post-war period. This message has been amplified by the newly restored Housing Minister Angela Raynor. The new Chancellor of the Exchequer, John Healey, was previously the shadow minister for housing. Healey is no radical. But he understands why housing matters and used to argue the main blockage to tackling escalating housing need lay with the Treasury. He’s now in a position to unblock it.

Burnham knows the biggest threat to Labour comes from Reform. That’s the main reason for his peculiar rise to power. The hard-right, led by Farage, has made anger about housing a key part of their political strategy, as have their counterparts in other European countries. The protests outside hotels lived in by migrants, and other outbursts of racist violence, have been fuelled by this anger. Housing policy has been failing and betraying working-class people for four decades. Burnham appears to recognise this cannot go on. He has staked the success of his domestic policy, and therefore his government, on solving the housing problem and rightly, has identified council housing as the way to do it.

That’s the optimistic reading. There are, of course, multiple reasons for pessimism. The key question is exactly what Burnham and co. mean by “council housing.” It is refreshing that they are, at least, explicitly using the term and not hiding behind the misleading labels “social” and “affordable” housing. However, sadly, there are numerous examples of Labour administrations around the country adulterating the core principles of council housing. In particular, while some councils have been building homes again — albeit in hundreds, not the thousands we need — invariably they are with rents significantly above the level that make them truly affordable (without relying on benefits) to the people who need them most. 

A worrying possibility is that Burnham incorporates his “private ownership, public control” mantra from Manchester buses into national housing policy. This could prepare the ground for keeping big private housing associations at the centre of funding and development decisions, where they have been since the early 1990s and have, on the whole, conspicuously failed. These so-called “social landlords” have gobbled up billions of pounds of public money and thousands of acres of public land, while supposedly being “controlled” by public regulators. But they have increasingly built homes for the private market or for misnomered “affordable rents,” while allowing their senior executives to pocket six-figure salaries. The Blair legacy project of “third way” housing provision has never got near matching the success of direct investment in council housing. 

In his book The Rentier City, Isaac Rose chronicles how Manchester became a neoliberal playground for private property developers, including under the stewardship of mayor Burnham. Any attempt to repeat that approach as prime minister will be disastrous.

The arguments for direct investment in genuine council homes go beyond housing. As the TUC and others have pointed out repeatedly, building the homes we need has a multiplier effect in the wider economy. Some of Burnham’s other policy objectives, particularly around training and jobs, can be addressed through a national council house building programme, prioritising use of public land and empty buildings, including in our high streets. This also presents a critical opportunity to develop more energy efficient homes, using skilled workers, technology and equipment from former heavy industry sites.  The climate crisis is here now and our homes are one of the main sources of carbon emissions — and of course, better insulated homes will mean cheaper energy bills. 

A new generation of energy efficient, truly affordable, secure, publicly owned, democratically controlled council housing will also help de-toxify private renting. Private landlords, often benefiting from huge tax breaks and subsidies, have thrived as council housing has declined. The government is shying away from reintroducing rent controls, but the best way of helping hyper-exploited private tenants is to give them a real alternative. This would also feed through to lower public spending, by reducing the current housing benefit bill of £25 billion and rising, almost half of which goes to private landlords. 

Doing these things requires the political courage to challenge the vested interests that profit from the failed neoliberal housing model. From that perspective, the early signs aren’t good. For example, Ms Raynor has recently given approval to a planning application in my home borough of Tower Hamlets that will not only provide a derisory amount of “affordable” housing, but also includes a data-centre that will take from our local community, and give to the corporate giants of the neighbouring City of London. 

Burnham is where he is because he is seen as a Farage-slayer. He may be, at least in the short-term. But at some point, he will have to demonstrate that he is willing to put the housing and other interests of working-class people above those of big business. If he does not, the far-right will continue to perpetuate myths and lies about housing, scapegoating non-white immigrants for a crisis created by the kind of people who lead and fund the Reform Party.

Ultimately, the power for housing change doesn’t lie at 10 Downing Street, but in the organised labour and tenant movements. We would never have had council housing and rent control in the first place if people hadn’t been prepared to demand and fight for them. But for too long, our unions have been spectators as housing has become a life-crushing issue for millions of workers and the tenant movement is not the force it was. But together, they can apply the kind of pressure that ensures the new prime minister fulfils his housing pledges.