More than 1,500 social homes lost in Wigan over past decade

The figures come as housing charity Shelter urges the Government to invest in a new generation of "genuinely social housing".

Data from the Department of Levelling Up, Housing and Communities show 106 social homes were built in Wigan in the ten years to March 2022 – including 32 in the latest year.

Meanwhile, 1,699 social homes were sold and 236 demolished over the same period – meaning that the area has lost 1,829 homes over the past ten years.

Across England, 194,000 social homes were sold in the decade to March 2022, and 55,000 demolished.

Just 84,000 were built over the same period – resulting in a net loss of 165,000 social homes.

These figures do not include sales for low-cost homeownership.

Polly Neate, chief executive of Shelter, said the country is "firmly in the red" when it comes to its social housing stock.

“We lose far more homes than we build every year, and the losses are mounting up,” she said.

“The social housing deficit is at the heart of the housing emergency.

“The fundamental lack of genuinely affordable homes has pushed millions of people into insecure, expensive and often discriminatory private renting.”

A Wigan Council spokesperson said: “Delivering high quality, affordable homes is a key pillar of The Deal 2030 and over the past few years our affordable housing delivery has significantly increased. As of the 1 February, alongside direct delivery by the Council and by working with our partner housing associations and private developers (via developer obligations), there have been 364 new affordable homes completed since the start of 2022/23 - this is the highest figure on record going into the final quarter of the year.

“We expect this strong housing growth to remain at a high level as we draw towards the end of the financial year, with over 450 affordable housing completions lined up to be formally completed by the end of the year (March 2023). This also exceeds our annual affordable housing target of bringing forward 338 new affordable homes.

“The data from Department of Levelling Up, Housing and Communities focusses only on ‘social rent’ but there are several different tenures of affordable housing in Wigan Borough, including – Affordable Rent, Rent to Buy and low-cost home ownership options such as Shared Ownership, Equity Loans and others.

“Currently, the highest need in our borough is for more Affordable Rent homes. Across the borough affordable rent levels and social rent levels are broadly similar in Wigan and the council, along with housing provider partners and commercial developers deliver a significant level of affordable rented homes on an annual basis.”

Different figures from DLUHC also show that as of March 2022, 1.2 million people were on local authority waiting lists for social housing across England – including 10,404 in Wigan.

Ms Neate added: "The Government can’t afford to allow this decline to stretch into another decade if it has any hopes of meaningfully levelling up.

"Instead, it must invest in a new generation of the homes we really need – secure, genuinely social housing.”

Recent research by the Resolution Foundation think tank found nearly one in five social renters have fallen behind on their housing costs this winter.

Meanwhile nearly half of social renters reported being unable to afford to replace electrical goods, or switch the heating on when needed, the researchers found.

A spokesperson for the Department of Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, said: “Increasing the number of genuinely affordable homes is central to our levelling up mission.

“Since 2010 we have delivered over 620,000 affordable homes in England, including over 160,000 for social rent.

“But there is much more to do and that is why we’re investing £11.5bn to build more of the affordable, quality homes this country needs.”