Housing Secretary Steve Reed was left floundering when pressed on how many homes Labour has delivered since coming to power.
In a tense exchange on The Camilla Tominey Show on GB News yesterday (main picture), host Camilla repeatedly asked the minister for the figure, which he was unable to provide.
At one point, Mr Reed snapped: “I am not Wikipedia,” insisting he was there to discuss policy rather than reel off statistics.
Tominey hit back: “But I am not in charge of housing. How can my producer have this figure and you not?”
THIRTEEN YEARS
Eventually, Tominey revealed the number herself: just 117,390 homes have been built under Labour to date. At this pace, the Government would need 13 years to reach its promise of 1.5 million new homes before the end of this Parliament.
Mr Reed admitted the figure was “really low” but sought to pin the blame on the Conservatives for failing to process planning applications before Labour took office.
He added: “What I know I need to do is build new homes.”
The exchange highlighted the growing pressure on Labour’s housing strategy, which has been beset by sluggish planning approvals.
STALLING DEVELOPMENT
The latest Government statistics show that development is stalling at record levels. Only 29,000 residential projects received planning permission in the year to June 2025 – the lowest on record.
Between April and June alone, councils received 80,400 planning applications, down 5% on the previous year. Local authorities processed 80,000 in that period, a 1% fall.
With planning bottlenecks worsening and completions lagging far behind targets, critics warn Labour’s pledge to fix Britain’s housing crisis risks collapsing under the weight of its own arithmetic.
