Sunderland 'loses' almost 1,500 social homes

Data from the Department of Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) show just 45 social homes were built in the area in the ten years to March last year – but 1,157 were sold and 375 demolished over the same period, meaning the area lost 1,487 over the decade.

Across England, 194,000 social homes were sold and 55,000 demolished, with just 84,000 being built - a net loss of 165,000.

Different figures from DLUHC show, as of March, 1.2 million people in England were on local authority waiting lists for a home.

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

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

The charity’s chief executive Polly Neate, said: “We lose far more homes than we build every year, and the losses are mounting up.

“The social housing deficit is at the heart of the housing emergency and the fundamental lack of genuinely affordable homes has pushed millions of people into insecure, expensive and often discriminatory private renting.”

She 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.”

A DLUHC spokesperson said: “Since 2010 we have delivered over 620,000 affordable homes, including over 160,000 for social rent and we’re investing £11.5bn to build more.”