Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch has pledged to end social housing tenancies for foreign nationals if elected, the Financial Times reported. The party estimates the plan would make about 230,000 households currently in receipt of such accommodation ineligible. According to the FT, the policy would not initially apply to existing EU-citizen tenants; however, for all future tenancies, only British nationals would be eligible to act as lead tenant, with all other nationalities — including EU citizens — excluded.
Shadow Work and Pensions Secretary Helen Whately said housing in Britain “should be earned by working, paying tax and integrating. It should not come with a free ride on the benefits system.” Reform UK’s shadow home secretary, Zia Yusuf, criticised the plan, saying: “Incredibly, Kemi Badenoch’s new policy is to allow tens of thousands of foreign nationals from the EU to occupy British social housing funded by British taxpayers.”
The announcement came after anti-immigration protesters in Thetford, Norfolk, attacked homes reportedly being used to house asylum seekers, with Norfolk Police reporting “significant aggression” over two evenings and five arrests. The Conservatives and Reform UK are both seeking to position themselves as hardline on migration, an issue that remains among the top two concerns for the British public alongside the economy, according to a YouGov tracker. Net migration to the UK has almost halved to 171,000, the lowest level since 2021.
References
Financial Times — Tories vow to ban foreign nationals from accessing UK social housing
