Housebuilders warn first-time buyers remain "locked out" as ministers tout planning reforms and housing "green shoots"
Steve Reed, the secretary of state for housing, met leading housebuilders this week to discuss planning reform, market conditions and what more is needed to unlock housing delivery – as the industry warns that first-time buyers remain “locked out” without government-backed support.
Reed was joined at the roundtable by Chief Secretary to the Treasury James Murray, with senior figures from developers including Vistry Group PLC and Barratt Redrow PLC in attendance. The meeting focused on proposed planning reforms, early signs of recovery in the housing market and what 2026 could bring for the sector, alongside the next phase of the government’s pro-growth and pro-supply agenda.
A source close to Reed said the housing secretary sees “green shoots of recovery” but is determined that “neither the government nor industry can afford to be complacent” about the scale of the housing crisis. He is expected to stress the joint responsibility of ministers and developers to help deliver 1.5 million homes and to ensure more families can buy their own home.
The roundtable comes ahead of the second phase of the government’s new homes accelerator project, designed to speed up the delivery of large-scale developments across England, and follows a series of changes to planning rules and land release policies intended to boost supply.
HBF: Lack of buyer support and tax burden ‘limiting’ supply
Responding to the talks, Steve Turner, spokesperson for the Home Builders Federation (HBF), told Mortgage Introducer that the industry welcomes the renewed interest from ministers but warned that policy gaps are still holding back both demand and supply.
“We welcome the engagement with ministers and share the government’s ambition to increase housing delivery. Planning reform has been a very positive step forward, but further government action is now needed to remove the remaining barriers,” Turner said.
“With no government-backed scheme in place for the first time in decades, many first-time buyers are locked out of the market, suppressing demand and limiting the ability to increase supply. At the same time, the cumulative burden of taxation is making too many developments unviable,” Turner added.
“Addressing these issues would unlock higher levels of housebuilding, supporting jobs, growth and the delivery of the new homes the country urgently needs.”
Implications for mortgages and first-time buyers
For lenders and intermediaries, the combination of tentative market recovery, planning reform and the lack of targeted buyer support will be central to how the new-build and first-time buyer segments evolve over the next two years.
While developers and ministers are aligned on the need to increase supply, the industry’s message is that, without measures to help creditworthy first-time buyers onto the ladder and to ease tax-related pressures on development viability, delivery may fall short of the government’s ambitions.
This week's roundtable is therefore being closely watched across the mortgage market as a test of whether the next phase of housing policy will pair planning reform with more direct support for buyers and investment in new homes – or whether, despite early signs of recovery, the sector remains constrained by affordability and viability challenges.
