One of Britain’s biggest housebuilders blasted planning rules as it reported a sharp drop in the number of homes it built last year.
Taylor Wimpey said the ‘planning system remains slow’ and ‘challenging’ – delaying much-needed new developments across the country.
The FTSE 100 housebuilder completed 10,438 homes in 2023 compared to 13,773 in the previous year, a decline of 3,335 properties, or 24 per cent.
It comes after rival Persimmon said on Wednesday that it built the fewest homes in more than a decade in 2023.
Persimmon built 33 per cent, or 5,000, fewer homes in 2023, with 9,922 completions, the lowest since it recorded 9,903 in 2012.
Setbacks: Taylor Wimpey said the ‘planning system remains slow’ and ‘challenging’ – delaying much-needed new developments across the country
Housing firms slashed construction targets as they struggled with planning delays and potential buyers were deterred by high mortgage rates.
Borrowing costs soared after interest rates hit a 15-year-high following 14 consecutive hikes.
The steep fall in homes built by the UK’s largest builders comes amid ‘an already acute housing crisis’, industry body the Home Builders Federation said.
Its policy director David O’Leary said it was the ‘inevitable outcome of several years of anti-growth policy and rhetoric’.
‘Falling supply amid an already acute housing crisis has huge social and economic implications, is costing tens of thousands of jobs and removing access to decent housing for a generation,’ he said.
