Millions of families face a cost of living crisis over rents, says Theresa May, as she urges Boris Johnson to put tackling “exorbitant”  housing costs at the heart of his levelling up agenda.

In a foreword to a new study by the think tank Centre for Social Justice (CJS), the former prime minister will say on Monday the Tories need to rediscover their commitment to affordable housing as the costs of private renting are exacting “a huge toll on our nation’s collective health, wellbeing and finances”.

She will say polling by the CJS shows this is in tune with the Red Wall voters who put Mr Johnson in Downing Street as two-thirds (67 per cent) back making social housing a government priority, compared with less than half that among traditional Tory voters in shire counties.

She will warn this “hidden housing crisis” means people’s hard-earned cash is being swallowed up by “exorbitant” housing costs. 

Rent eats up disposable income

CJS data showed more than two-thirds of private renters in the lowest income brackets had more than 30 per cent of their disposable income eaten away by rent. 

She will say that as a result, nearly two million couples had delayed or chosen not to start a family because of their housing situation. 

“Some 124,000 children will go to sleep tonight in temporary accommodation, facing significantly hampered educational prospects as a result,” she will say.

Taxpayers faced having to foot a bill for housing benefit estimated by the CJS at more than £30 billion next year – and double that in the next 30 years as pensioners are forced into private rented accommodation.

 She admits the focus on helping the “just about homeowners” onto the ladder has distracted from what should be “our overwhelming priority as Conservatives: ensuring that everyone has a decent, affordable and secure home in which to live, work and build strong families”.

“Rediscovering our tradition of truly affordable housebuilding for the 2020s is what is needed if we are to address the social, economic and fiscal costs of the hidden housing crisis,” she will say.

 “Moreover, as polling evidence presented by the CSJ suggests, this would be in tune with the views and desires of the new electorate as it has realigned in the years following the [Brexit] Referendum.

 “So now I call on Conservatives to let us make it our shared mission, once again, to fix this hidden housing crisis as a central plank of our levelling up agenda.”

Quarter of the population struggle to pay monthly housing costs

The CJS research found a quarter of the population found it difficult to pay monthly housing costs, rising to 43 per cent of private renters.

 Yet official figures showed the number of homes for social rent built annually has fallen to 6,000, despite more than 95,000 households currently living in expensive temporary accommodation.

 The poll for CSJ by Stack Data Strategy found less than one in four people (24 per cent) believed the government’s definition of affordable housing was truly affordable to local people. 

Just under two thirds (63 per cent) backed the need for more low-cost homes to rent to end the housing crisis.