Kim McGuinness says she wants to use the next 12 months to “really make a dent” into the problems that have left tens of thousands of people on bloated waiting lists for council homes.
Under new housebuilding targets confirmed by the Labour Government in December, councils across the North East and Tees Valley areas will have to deliver a combined 10,976 new homes built every year – in order to hit a national target of 1.5 million by 2029.
While critics have branded that aim “undeliverable”, Ms McGuinness told the Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS) that “finding ways to complain about the target is not going to solve the problem”.
The Labour mayor said she was especially keen to resolve what has been called a “social housing emergency” hitting the North East worse than any other region.
Official figures show that the number of households on a waiting list for social housing across the wider region jumped from 50,453 in 2022 to 75,985 in 2023, a 51 per cent jump that was far higher than anywhere else in England.
Ms McGuinness said: “It is now really urgent that we get on with this. We have seen measures brought forward by the Government to oil the wheels – more devolution of decision-making into our region.
“Councils will naturally be nervous and I totally understand that, but what I have seen around our cabinet table is a real willingness and a commitment to tackle that issue.
“All of us are affected by it, but nobody more so than those people who are in insecure housing or trapped in an unsafe home or who are homeless and not living anything like the sort of quality of life they deserve. We all deserve a good home.
“There is a commitment in this region to crack on and do it. Finding ways to complain about the target is not going to solve the problem, we need to find a way to get delivering and deliver some housing quickly – and deliver good quality, greener housing.”
The North East Combined Authority has announced investment into a handful of housing development sites – including the Forth Yards and Health Innovation Neighbourhood projects in Newcastle, and a regeneration of Horden in East Durham.
Ms McGuinness added: “Those are great, but now we need to know what is next and how we are battering down the barriers and building some of the housing – particularly social housing – that people so desperately need as well as improving things for people who rent.”
The former Northumbria Police and Crime Commissioner was elected in May 2024 as mayor, the first person to hold the office taking charge of a combined authority stretching across Tyne and Wear, Northumberland and County Durham.
She described her first months in office as a “whirlwind” but said she believed that NECA had “moved at pace” to start delivering some of her big promises – including bringing the North East’s bus network under public control, taking the Tyne and Wear Metro to Washington, and combating child poverty.
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She admitted that those are “very long term projects” that would not be pushed through quickly, but said that a promised childcare grant to help parents get back into the workplace would be launched in 2025.
The mayor added: “I believe we end the year much stronger than we started it. Looking back prior to my election, I think the hearing that our region was getting was not what we deserved.
“We certainly weren’t getting, and hadn’t over the course of the last government, the investment we deserved. Mayors in general across the country will walk away from 2024 thinking we are now very much at the top table making the decisions that matter to improve lives for people in our region.”