Housing should be right at home in the UK’s new modern Industrial Strategy

“As the voice of the rental living sector, including urban and suburban Build to Rent (BTR), the Association for Rental Living (ARL) welcomes the Government’s announcement of the intention to create to new modern Industrial Strategy for the UK and believe that housing should be right at home in Invest 2035 to enable its successful delivery.

“The ARL welcomes the pledges made in the Invest 2035 Green Paper – of growth as the primary mission, that jobs will be at the heart of the Industrial Strategy, that it will be international from the start and pro-business, engaging on issues such as planning. We also welcome acknowledgment of the role of infrastructure, and of Place as a core Strategy objective with placemaking & community being one of the four pillars of BTR alongside investment & growth, the accelerated delivery of homes, and affordability & security. The ARL has long argued that housing is an essential part of social infrastructure and should be viewed as such.

“The BTR sector has already attracted £35 billion of institutional investment in the last decade; it has the ability to attract £300 billion of domestic and international inward investment and deliver over 2 million good quality, professionally managed homes to rent across the UK. The Government, in its first 100 days, has already recognised the massive demand for new homes, outlined its commitment to transforming the experience of private renting through its proposed Renters’ Rights Bill and recognised the role of BTR in the NPPF Review. The ARL would now call on the Government to view housing as a critical part of its 10-year infrastructure strategy (in development), to deliver Invest 2035.

“As stated in the Invest 2035 Green Paper, partnership will be key and hence the ARL, and its membership, remains available to working in partnership with the Government, local authorities and policymakers to deliver the new rental homes we believe are so critical to the successful delivery of a new modern Industrial Strategy for the UK.”    

Brendan Geraghty, CEO, ARL

More information on the open consultation – Invest 2035: the UK’s modern industrial strategy – is available here.
The consultation closes at 11.59pm on 24 November 2024.