Memorandum submitted by the Home Builders
Federation
INTRODUCTION
1.1 The Home Builders Federation (HBF) is
the principal trade federation for private sector house builders
and the voice of the house building industry in England and Wales.
The HBF's 300 member firms account for over 80% of all new houses
built in England and Wales in any one year, and include companies
of all sizes, ranging from multi-national, household names through
regionally based businesses to small local companies.
1.2 The HBF is helping companies build sustainable
housing and meet relevant environmental objectives while delivering
the numbers and types of homes required to meet people's needs
and aspirations.
IMPROVING SUSTAINABLE
DEVELOPMENT PRACTICES
2.1 The industry is making good progress
advancing sustainable development practices.
2.2 The second WWF and Insight Investment
benchmark report published in September 2005 studied the sustainability
practices of 12 major home builders, accounting for 41% of all
housing units completed in the UK in 2004. The report concluded
that all 12 companies had "substantially improved their performance"
over the last year. The average score was 68% versus 47% in 2004
and 10 of the 12 companies in the study scored 60% or above.[1]
2.3 House builders have responded well to
the Government's brownfield and density targets: According to
figures made available by ODPM in August, 70% of new build is
now on brownfield land—an all-time record. Meanwhile, average
density of new homes development has increased nationally to 40dph
(dwellings per hectare), up from 25dph in 1997.[2]
TAKING A
LEAD ON
SUSTAINABLE HOUSING
3.1 The HBF has a wide range of initiatives
to promote best practice and sustainable construction.
3.2 In September 2005, the HBF published
"Sustainability in Housebuilding", designed as a showcase
of some of Britain's finest sustainable housing schemes. The HBF
worked in partnership with several other stakeholders including,
Business in the Community, CITB-ConstructionSkills, English Partnerships,
Sustainable Homes and WWF to select the examples of best practice
featured in this publication.
3.3 The HBF is also a member of WWF's One
Million Sustainable Homes Task Force and values the opportunity
to discuss the policy and market context for delivering sustainability
objectives that this provides.
3.4 Again in September 2005, the first annual
Housebuilding Innovation Awards were launched to reward industry
achievement. The focus of these awards is to recognise those in
the industry who are innovating to improve quality, design, efficiency
and customer care.
3.5 The HBF has supported the development
of the South East Sustainability Checklist developed by the Building
Research Establishment for SEERA. The checklist is a tool that
gives a score for proposed developments covering sustainability
in terms of their environmental impact, the local economy and
community. It breaks down performance into key areas—providing
an important indication of areas for future improvement.
3.6 The SE checklist is currently being
used as a model for rolling out similar checklists across the
English regions. HBF is supporting this initiative as a means
of promoting a consistent and practical approach to achieving
sustainable development.
3.7 In association with CABE and the Civic
Trust, HBF is one of the founding partners in the Building for
Life (BfL) initiative which aims to promote design excellence
in new housing. The BfL partners have adopted a BfL "standard"
that is awarded to projects demonstrating high quality design.
The standard is based on 20 criteria, including whether the development
has features that reduce its environmental impact.
3.8 Eight new housing developments across
England were awarded the Building for Life Standard in October
2005. Five out of the eight developments were by top 10 volume
house builders. Announcing the awards, Richard Simmons CABE chief
executive said: "This round of awards is the strongest we
have seen since Building for Life was launched in 2002 . . . These
schemes plant a seed of hope; evidence that the big companies
can produce housing of an exceptional quality across the country."[3]
3.9 Many house builders are also investing
in capacity and research in modern methods of construction (MMC).
Amongst other potential benefits MMC can be a means of achieving
improvements in the environmental performance of new homes and
in reducing construction waste.
3.10 The HBF initiated and has continued
to facilitate an extensive programme of work in response to Recommendation
33 of the Barker Report on Housing Supply to look into the obstacles
to the greater use of MMC as a commercially efficient means of
improving building performance and quality while helping to deliver
an increased supply of new homes. This work is now nearly complete
and has uniquely involved all the parties with an interest and
role to play in this field so as to reach a consensus view on
the relevant issues.
3.11 In parallel, HBF's major members—the
Major Home Builders Group (MHBG)—have adopted a number of
important new initiatives on skills. These have been adopted jointly
with CITB-ConstructionSkills and include a new initiative with
the MHBG's subcontractor supply chain that aims to significantly
increase the number of training places for skilled trades within
the house building industry and joining the Qualified Workforce
Initiative with the aim of having a fully carded workforce by
the end of 2007.
INQUIRY QUESTIONS
A: The Code for Sustainable Buildings
4.1 The HBF believes the Code plays an important
part in encouraging future improvements in this field, but regulation
cannot on its own be the whole answer.
4.2 Issues connected with consumer requirements
and lifestyle also have a major bearing on how homes can be built
sustainably and marketed commercially. We need to take consumers
with us if more regulatory approaches are to be successful.
4.3 Our yardstick in assessing the Government's
proposal for the Code is whether it is an efficient and cost-effective
way of encouraging further improvements in sustainability as part
of an increase in housing supply.
4.4 On that score, while we welcome the
less prescriptive approach set out in the proposed Code, if it
is going to assist the delivery of new housing there remain some
significant issues to resolve, notably the Code's relationship
with the planning system.
4.5 Discussions on the proposals for the
Code took longer than originally expected and this has necessarily
limited the degree to which it has been possible to promote the
Code to date. We believe that the Government's policy of requiring
housing development receiving Government funding to meet the Code
in future will be an effective way of promoting its approach to
the industry. Promotion to the public will be more difficult.
4.6 Given the consumer issues involved and,
in some cases the costs, there may be a case for considering effectively
targeted fiscal incentives as part of an overall policy framework.
B: Sustainable Communities: Homes for All
5.1 Government policy has introduced new
measures to help tackle the environmental impacts of housing development.
5.2 Planning policies on density and the
use of previously developed land have resulted in major changes
in the pattern and impact of development in recent years. The
need to foster sustainable development is enshrined in Planning
Policy Statement 1.
5.3 Revisions of the building regulations
are also making a significant contribution to a reduced environmental
impact by new housing. The latest revision of Part L of the building
regulations will mean that new homes built under these regulations
will be 40% more energy efficient than those built some five years
earlier. And modern homes are as much as eight times more energy
efficient than those built a hundred years ago.
5.4 It is also necessary, however, to work
with the grain of the housing market and what people are seeking
from their homes and neighbourhoods. Successful and sustainable
communities need to work socially and economically as well as
environmentally and we should recognise that some changes that
may be sought are dependent for their delivery on consumer attitude
and behaviour as well as or rather than Government policy.
C: Infrastructure
6.1 The Government has initiated an important
new policy debate on infrastructure funding through its current
consultation on a proposed Planning-gain Supplement.
6.2 We recognise that the current planning
gain mechanism, known as Section 106 agreements, takes too long,
is too arbitrary and is so opaque that development is discouraged.
This leads to fewer, not more homes being built and is not necessarily
delivering a transparent and efficient provision of the infrastructure
needed.
6.3 We agree with the Government's objective
of providing the right incentives for development and a sensible
and transparent approach to delivering local infrastructure. It
is not yet clear whether the Government's proposal is the right
one. It will also be essential for any new approach to have wide
support. Without such consensus, history shows that such ideas
will not work.
January 2006
1 Housebuilders improving on sustainability,
WWF Press Release, 6 September 2005. Back
2
Brownfield development reaches record level, ODPM Press
Release, 28 July 2005. Back
3
Housing giants show it can be done, CABE Press Release,
14 October 2005. Back
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