Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what assessment his Department has made of the effect of the price of land on affordable housing provision; and what steps he will take to reduce the cost of land to support social home builders.

My Department has recently introduced planning reforms to make it clear that under no circumstances will the price paid for land be a relevant justification for failing to meet affordable housing requirements. Between 2015-16 and 2017-18, we delivered over 122,000 affordable homes, of which over 53,000 units were delivered through section 106 agreements - not including housing delivered through London Affordable Rent or where tenure was unknown.