Manchester City Council chooses pension fund as investor for 1,600-home plans

The Greater Manchester Pension Fund (GMPF) has been selected by Manchester City Council as the institutional investor for plans to build almost 1,600 homes.

The partnership announcement comes two days after the mayor of Greater Manchester, Andy Burnham, called on the government to address “the single biggest cause of Britain’s modern malaise: a housing crisis caused not by immigration but by ideology”.

Manchester City Council’s executive will vote on the creation of the new joint venture between GMPF and This City, the local authority’s housing company, when it meets on 4th June.

The partnership is for phase two of This City’s scheme, the initial pipeline for which consists of 1,583 homes on council-owned brownfield sites, of which 20% will be affordable homes to rent.

Council leader, Cllr Bev Craig, said: “These homes will contribute to our housing strategy target to deliver at least 36,000 new homes up to 2032 – and at least 10,000 of these homes will be social, Council or genuinely affordable.

“These are ambitious numbers and we are on track to meet them.”

Cllr Gavin White, executive member for housing and development, said: “Having GMPF on board with This City as an institutional investor will help us deliver at scale the new housing, including significant amounts of affordable housing, which Manchester needs.

“We’re seeing a step change and acceleration in the delivery of affordable housing, with more being built now than at any point in the last 12 years and with even more in the pipeline.”

Cllr Eleanor Wills, chair of GMPF, said: “We are acutely aware of the severe housing crisis both nationally and in the North-West region. This is why we are proud to continue our longstanding partnership with Manchester City Council investing in the This City vehicle that supports the Government’s plan to provide much-needed affordable homes for hardworking families while ensuring strong, low-risk returns to secure the pensions of our members.”

Proposed This City sites include 126 new homes on Postal Street, Piccadilly; 85 homes on Hyde Road, Longsight; 750 homes on Monsall, Harpurhey: 136 homes on Grey Mare Lane, Ancoats and Beswick; 166 homes on Downing Street, Ardwick; 256 homes on Heyrod Street, Piccadilly; and 64 homes on Kirkmanshulme Lane, Longsight.

Postal Street is the most advanced of the phase two sites with a planning application expected to be submitted in the coming weeks.

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Engagement with local communities in Monsall and Longsight started earlier this year.

Formal consultation will be undertaken later this year with local people in the Grey Mare Lane estate in east Manchester.

This City’s first project, No.1 Ancoats Green, is nearing completion – with 129 low carbon homes created next to the brilliant new green space and park at Ancoats Green. Almost a third (30%) will be available at the Manchester Living Rent.

Speaking on Saturday at an event organised by thinktank Compass at the Ministry of Sound nightclub in London, Mayor Burnham reportedly called for Labour to “re-establish itself unequivocally once again as the party of working-class ambition”.

“Labour’s clarion call should be to free Britain from the grip of the housing crisis. In this spending review, working with mayors in the big city regions, it should set the date by which each will reach the crucial tipping point of building more social homes than they are losing,” said Burnham, according to a report in The Guardian.

“This is the moment when, instead of tightening its grip, the housing crisis starts to ease. To do that, the spending review should unlock public land for mayors to use to build a new generation of council homes at pace – akin to the drive of the postwar Labour government.”