A version of this article by Cllr Cameron Holloway, Leader of the council (pictured), was first published in Cambridge Independent on 26 November 2025.

It’s no secret that Cambridge has some of the least affordable housing in the UK.

But, everyone deserves a warm, safe, and affordable home.

That’s why, at Cambridge City Council, we’re doing our utmost to build high-quality council homes. We own over 7,600 homes, providing a secure tenancy and subsidised rents to thousands of people across the city. Cambridge City Council is one of the few councils in the country that has managed to increase its number of council homes in the last few years.

We believe that council tenants, just like everyone else, deserve high-quality, warm, energy-efficient homes, and we’re proud to be able to provide that with our new homes. Elaine, who moved from Hanover Court into a brand new home at Ironworks, said: “As soon as I walked into one of the apartments, I was completely overwhelmed and immediately fell in love with it. If I could have moved in there and then…I would have!”

We’re building more council homes per capita than almost any other council in the country – we were one of the top 10 council house builders in the UK in both 2023 and 2024. Through Cambridge Investment Partnership, or ‘CIP’, our joint venture with Hill, we build a mixture of council homes and market-sale homes – creating balanced communities, and meeting local demand for both council and market homes. The market homes help to fund the council homes, as well as much-needed community facilities, such as parks, preschools and community centres.

The partnership has now built around 1,150 new homes, including 700 net new council homes, across 23 different sites in Cambridge. And we want to go further – we have plans for another 1,000 council homes and 1,000 market homes in the coming years – we hope to secure Government support for this through the Social and Affordable Housing Programme.

Building new homes is a costly business, and it is essential that we get the affordability right on each scheme to ensure that the investment we make works for future tenants, but also for the health of the council’s long-term finances. This influences our approach to the rents we charge to tenants in our new council homes.

The vast majority of our existing council homes are rented to council tenants at around 40-45% of market rents, known as ‘social rents’. Where tenants move out of ageing council homes so that we can re-build with higher-quality, more energy-efficient new council homes, they are likely to be charged slightly higher rents – 60% of market rents. Tenants in receipt of benefits are likely to have this increase covered, but this increased income makes a world of difference to the council’s balance sheet, as it enables us to cover the costs of building the new homes and invest in our existing housing stock. For tenants who aren’t in receipt of benefits, they will pay more on their rent, but will be saving on household bills due to the much more energy-efficient new housing.

We also build some homes which are rented to tenants at 80% of market rents. While these homes are available to people on the housing register, they are intended to support local workers who would be unlikely to be granted high priority status to bid for council homes available at social rents, but would still find it difficult to afford the high rents charged in Cambridge – such as resident doctors, nurses and newly qualified teachers.

Some of our council housing schemes involve knocking down old council homes and replacing them with new ones – recent examples include Ekin Road, Fanshawe Road, and Hanover and Princess Court. While we acknowledge that this is very difficult for people who have to move out of their homes, it is part of our duty as a landlord to ensure that our housing is up to a good standard.

We’ve now supported over 300 households into new homes in this way, making sure we look after tenants throughout the process: they get priority choice on a suitable, like-for-like council home; one-to-one support based on individual needs and circumstances; a home-loss payment, currently £8,100, plus an initial £1,250 payment to cover moving expenses; and the right to return to the new development after work is completed, if they want to.

Our officers really care, and try their best to cater to everyone’s needs. Vera, who moved from an old flat in Ekin Road to a brand new home in Colville Road in the same week she gave birth, said: “Moving home and giving birth all in the same week was quite the challenge, but having this new home has made it all worthwhile. It’s light, spacious, and we even have a garden to enjoy. The council and CIP teams were incredibly supportive, and I honestly can’t fault the process.”

When we build new council housing, we’re not just building houses – we’re building homes, for people like Vera and Elaine.