Housing Secretary: ‘We don’t know how Right to Buy will be funded yet’

The government’s new Right to Buy policy for housing association tenants appeared to unravel last night after the Housing Secretary said it would be capped and couldn’t divulge how it would be funded.

It was confirmed last week that the government was planning to extend Right to Buy to housing association tenants to help more people onto the property ladder.

But speaking to MPs on the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee, Michael Gove was unable to say how it was funded and revealed there would be limits.

Gove said:

“The overall numbers who will benefit in any given year will be capped.

“We will judge how many people in any given year we can fund to enjoy the voluntary Right to Buy.”

He added that a voluntary Right to Buy pilot in the Midlands last year also had restrictions.

MPs asked where the money from the scheme was coming from.

Gove said it did not come from his department’s budget, adding that it will come from “across government” and the Treasury has agreed that it “will be funded”.

He was also questioned on how housing associations will be encouraged to take part in the Right to Buy scheme.

Gove said they will be “seduced”, adding:

“My intelligence so far is that while housing associations quite rightly have a number of questions, they are not opposed in principle, they want to know the direction of travel.”

The issue of housebuilding was also raised, with MPs querying if there was still a target to build 300,000 homes per year.

Gove said this target remains, adding, “there are a number of factors that have made it more difficult”, such as the pandemic.

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