End £30bn bank benefits, tax wealth like work, break the gas price link, launch a rooftop solar revolution and build 1.4m homes. Peoplenomics in five steps.
Housing
Britain has enough brownfield land to build over a million homes, yet much of it sits derelict; too costly to clean up, too tangled in ownership to unlock.
Latest Housing articles
Putting solar on 1.8m UK social homes would save households £618 a year, add £5.1bn to the economy and support 7,600 jobs a year, new CEBR modelling shows.
Just 7.7% of council homes in England, Scotland and Wales have solar panels, our investigation finds. At this rate, catching up will take nearly 80 years.
Housing associations sold 5,250 homes in 2024-25 as 1.3m households sat on waiting lists. Councils want first refusal to buy them back before they're lost.
Mortlake's Stag Brewery site has permission for 1,000+ homes, yet it's been 'mothballed'. As UK housebuilding hits a 10-year low, why are we still waiting?
Public brownfield land could take 215,000 UK homes, with 176,000 more on mixed sites – a quarter of Labour's housing target. So why is building still so slow?
New CEBR analysis for Babelfish finds 1.4m homes could be built on brownfield land, adding 0.9% to GDP a year for a decade. Half already have planning permission.
Survation polling for Babelfish finds more people back than oppose charging housebuilders council tax on consented land they haven't built on. 49% back brownfield.
New CEBR research for Babelfish: 1.4m brownfield homes would unleash £259bn and return £1.92 for every £1 spent. The big five sit on 869,000 plots instead.
Britain's big five sit on 869,000 plots worth £275bn and build slowly to keep prices high. Start the rates clock the day permission is granted.
Barratt Redrow, Taylor Wimpey, Persimmon, Vistry and Bellway hold 869,000 plots between them. Taylor Wimpey's landbank alone would take 19.5 years to build out.
Babelfish commissioned CEBR to map England's brownfield sites. The result: 1.4m homes, £259bn in economic value and 370,000 jobs a year for a decade.
1.4m homes sit waiting on brownfield land. Building them would deliver £250bn, 400,000 jobs a year and £1.92 back for every £1 invested. The Big Five won't.
Barratt, Persimmon, Taylor Wimpey and four others face a £4.5bn claim. 700,000 buyers could be owed up to £6,200 each after the CMA's collusion investigation.