Select committee: Built Environment Committee
Conclusion 197
1st Report - Meeting housing demand
Published 10 Jan 2022
Built Environment Committee Meeting the UK’s housing demand All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗ Inquiry on parliament.uk ↗
Conclusion (the committee's words)
The construction sector is dominated by self-employed contractors. Self-employed workers comprise nearly 40% of the construction workforce, as opposed to under 15% across all industries. 292 Women are more likely than men to work as employees and less likely to be self-employed: in 2021, 88% of women in the construction sector were employees, compared with 80% of men. 293 The Construction Leadership Council’s Industry Skills Plan recommends increasing the rate of direct employment in the construction sector to modernise and improve skills, concluding that it is “an enabler of apprenticeships, digital upskilling and competence”. 294 On the other hand, this can be difficult for SMEs who may need to draw on a more flexible set of skills throughout a project. Off-payroll working rules, known as IR-35, determine the tax contributions for self-employed workers. 295 These rules were altered in April 2021 and may also have an impact on the ability to hire skilled resources on building sites. 296
From: Built Environment Committee, 1st Report - Meeting housing demand, 10 January 2022
Government response
The government responded to the whole report on 28 March 2022 (deadline 10 March 2022).
Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.The Government welcomes the Committee's report and says it is "taking action on a number of the issues identified", agreeing with some recommendations while disagreeing with others, including on home ownership schemes and the Apprenticeship Levy.
- It "disagrees with the report's assessment that homeownership schemes do not provide good value for money", citing independent evaluations and its own evaluation of Help to Buy.
- On older people's housing, it is launching a new taskforce "this year", chaired by the Minister for Housing, to look at better choice, quality and security of housing.
- It does "not intend to set out a proportion" of Affordable Homes Programme funding for social housing, though "around half" of the affordable homes are to be for social and affordable rent.
- On the Apprenticeship Levy it says it has "no plans to review" it. On planning fees it is "exploring options" to increase them, and on local plans it will make an announcement "in due course".