Without a single house being constructed, a government plan to develop abandoned military property for residential dwellings was covertly abandoned two years ago.
Up to 10,000 new dwellings were supposed to be delivered as part of the plan, but it was abandoned after the Ministry of Defence (MoD) removed the majority of the selected sites.
The MoD discovered more surplus "brownfield" land earlier this year, which could be developed into around 35,000 new dwellings.
However, the BBC can disclose that the government has not yet released or sold any of that land.
Throughout the general election campaign, Labour made housing a top priority and committed to building 1.5 million new homes over the following five years.
On Thursday, Housing Secretary and Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner said housebuilding had been held back by "a failure to make sure the development system is working as it should”.
She was speaking at the launch of a new team of planning experts that will be deployed to potential housing sites to work through blockages and and local issues.
But housing charity Shelter has criticised the government for not making use of the land identified by the now-defunct MoD scheme.
Polly Neate, chief executive of housing charity Shelter, told the BBC: “Government-owned land that is well located and suitable for housing is hard to come by, so when it’s available, it is vital that it is used to deliver more social rent homes for families on low incomes."
The now defunct MoD scheme, which was launched in 2019 and involved a partnership with Homes England, the government’s housing agency, identified an initial seven sites for development.
Homes England was set up by the last Conservative government and has a remit to acquire land and help build more affordable houses.
One site at MoD Stafford was released to Homes England but remains undeveloped.
Another in Ripon, in North Yorkshire, is still under consideration for private development and could accommodate 1,300 new houses.
The other five sites, at Prince William of Gloucester Barracks in Grantham, Lincolnshire; Swynnerton camp, in Stone, Staffordshire; RAF Henlow in Bedfordshire; Chetwynd Barracks in Chilwell, Nottinghamshire and Wethersfield Airfield in Braintree, Essex, were withdrawn from the programme by the government.
Reasons for withdrawal included military needs in the wake of the Ukraine invasion and Home Office plans to house asylum seekers.
It is understood some of the land initially identified was instead kept under MoD control and used to train Ukrainian soldiers.
Wethersfield Airfield had been one of the earmarked sites, but was instead taken over by the Home Office and began accommodating asylum seekers in July last year.
Following these decisions, the partnership between the MoD and Homes England was quietly ended in April 2022.
In March of this year, the MoD carried out a further review to determine how much vacant military land was suitable for housing.
That review found the land still available could accommodate 34,250 housing units, including the 1,300 in Ripon.
But a BBC Freedom of Information request has established that none of that land has been released to Homes England.
It is also acknowledged that none have been made available to or sold to private developers as of yet, although the MoD continues to express its intention to do so.
Forecasts for sites that might be sold in the upcoming years are included in the database that is used to determine the levels of excess land.
A representative for the government stated: "Some sites can take longer to regenerate and may also be used for much-needed infrastructure like new schools or health services."
"1,500 hectares for commercial, residential, private, and government development since 2019" had been made available by the MoD, the official continued.
SOURCE:BBC NEWS
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