Reform UK has pledged to prioritise British-born workers under-35 when allocating social housing if the party enters government.

Nigel Farage’s party, which narrowly leads Labour in most national polling, said it would also give precedence to veterans and married couples with children. Reform, which set their policy announcement in a press conference on Monday, previously said it would evict foreign nationals from social housing.

But charities and experts have warned that “changing the order of the queue” would not solve the issue of social housing and instead more homes needed to be built.

Housing charity Shelter said a change from strict rules already in place to allocate social housing based on who has the greatest need would put more people at risk of homelessness.

Vast majority of social housing already goes to UK nationals

British nationals already occupy the vast majority of social homes across England and Wales.

UK or Irish nationals made up 88.5 per cent of main householders – the person in whose name the social home is rented – in 2024/25, according to the English Housing Survey. Around 36 per cent of those people were in work, while 46 per cent had a physical or mental health condition.

The remaining 11.5 per cent who are non-UK or Irish nationals include those who are long-term UK residents, have children who were born in the UK, and those who may not have yet applied for British citizenship.

Government statistics also indicate that 85 per cent of applicants seeking or waiting for social housing are UK nationals, with 7 per cent from the European Economic Area (EEA), including Ireland, and 8 per cent from outside the EEA.

Labour said Reform’s plan goes after “long-term UK residents that have contributed to our country but are not British citizens, including NHS staff.”

Allocation rules already incredibly tight

The requirements for being accepted for social housing in England and Wales are already incredibly tight. The people who are offered new social lettings often have the greatest or most urgent housing needs, such as people who are homeless, particularly those who are homeless with children, disabled or living with long-term health conditions.

Illegal migrants, asylum seekers and migrants on student or work visas are not eligible for social housing. Councils, whose role it is to allocate social housing, are already legally required to follow a strict set of rules based on which applicants are in the greatest need.

Sarah Elliott, Shelter’s chief executive, said the system is already designed to “prioritise people who are homeless or at urgent risk of homelessness” and Reform’s proposed changes to put “nationality and employment ahead of housing need” would leave “even more families trapped in awful temporary accommodation for years on end.

“Not to mention putting those escaping domestic abuse and violence at serious risk of harm.”

She said Reform’s plans were “designed to stoke division” and would only serve to tear communities apart and put more people at risk of homelessness.

Limits with the data

Reform UK estimates 540,000 social homes are currently occupied by foreign nationals. However, as the Chartered Institute of Housing (CIH) warned, the data is too patchy to know exactly what’s going on.

“Data on the nationality of people on housing registers needs to be treated with caution,” Rachael Williamson, CIH’s director of policy, communications and external affairs, said.

Other estimates suggest 470,000 non-UK and non-Irish citizens are living in social housing.

Nationality information is available for only 22 per cent of the households on registers. This means that estimates of the total number of non-UK nationals on housing registers should not be presented as robust national figures.

The available data also does not identify whether a UK citizen was born in the UK or overseas, meaning it cannot be used to establish how many applicants are “British-born”.

However, as previously written about in Vicky Spratt’s The State We’re In newsletter the Home Office has been competing with local councils for housing that it can use to temporarily accommodate asylum seekers, which may have contributed to a shortage of emergency accommodation in some places but, crucially, not to shortages of social housing.

The Conservatives also unveiled their plans for social housing earlier this month, suggesting they would revoke the right of foreign nationals to social housing. The party said this plan would free up around 230,000 homes. The Tory plan would allow Irish citizens and some EU nationals to remain in social housing.

More low-income households are renting privately

Across England alone, more than 1.3 million households are currently languishing on social housing waiting lists. This figure has remained relatively consistent for years and hit its highest level since 2014 last year (1.34 million) because the number of people who qualify for social housing has increased.

One possible reason for this is that the number of households becoming homeless – particularly families with children – has risen. Low-income families have been forced out of homes they rent privately from landlords when rents go up. They then end up in temporary accommodation, waiting for social housing.

Similarly, the number of single individuals becoming homeless has risen. This may include older private renters who can no longer afford private rent. The issue of retired renters has been described as a “ticking time bomb” by homelessness experts.

At the same time, the number of available social homes and the number of new social homes built have declined.

Since 1981, the total number of social homes across the UK has dropped from roughly 6.8 million down to 5.2 million, and the proportion of households living in social housing has almost halved from 31 per cent to 17 per cent.

This means that a higher number of low-income households are renting privately than they used to and are therefore more exposed to rising rents.

More homes need to be built

Fewer social homes have been built over the last two decades while millions of existing social homes were sold off under the Right to Buy scheme.

Shelter said the solution to fixing social housing was to build more homes rather than “changing the order of the queue”.

Reform UK MP Richard Tice said the party would build 50,000 affordable social homes a year, which he says will require no new taxes or borrowing.

Shelter, however, estimates 90,000 new homes a year are needed over the next decade.

Homelessness could rise as an unintended consequence 

Reform UK have already committed to removing foreign nationals from social housing, pledging to evict them after “a short grace period”.

A person may be deemed a “foreign national”, but they may have indefinite leave to remain (ILR). Someone in this situation would have a legal right to homelessness support.

Reform says their policy proposal would “free up hundreds of thousands of social homes”, but it could also cause a huge spike in homelessness and place further pressure on local councils, who would likely still have a legal duty to house people who had qualified for social housing in the first place unless Britain’s complex housing laws were completely overhauled.

Many of these newly homeless people would likely be vulnerable and have complex needs.