Labour’s housebuilding target ‘impossible the day it was announced’ says construction boss
Labour’s housebuilding target was impossible the day it was announced, the boss of a leading construction materials firm has warned.
Rob Wood, chief executive of materials specialist Breedon Group, told CityAM the government’s plans to build 1.5m homes by the next general election will fail because Labour is not backing its construction industries.
Wood is calling on the government to protect the UK’s domestic supply of cement, which he says is under threat from uneven carbon regulation, high energy prices, rising labour costs and the increasing flow of cement imports into the country.
He suggested that Labour’s undervaluing of the wider construction industry is one of the reasons it will miss its housing target.
Wood said: “The day they announced it, it was already impossible. I can’t believe they still talk about it.
“They haven’t got that long left, and if you look at the current run rates they’re not going to get anywhere near it.”
Net additions to the UK’s housing stock will fall from a 260,000 yearly average to a low point of 220,000 in 2026-27, according to the Office for Budget Responsibility’s latest forecasts.
Labour’s introduction of loosened planning rules is yet to “meaningfully materialise” in the speed of house building, the watchdog said.
The next election, the deadline for Labour’s house target, is expected to come in 2029 but the OBR said house building will not meaningfully spike until 2030.
‘Labour’s industrial strategy at risk’
Wood is calling on the government to address the cost of electricity in the UK and promote domestically produced cement in public procurement, to counter the “serious risks” faced by the cement industry.
“If there isn’t a robust and healthy domestic cement industry, everything will have to be imported, […] and ultimately it will all depend on the availability of products from overseas,” he said.
Demand for key construction materials like concrete (-9.9 per cent), aggregates (-1.6 per cent) and asphalt (-1.1 per cent) fell for a fourth consecutive year in 2025, according to a Mineral Products Association (MPA) report.
Wood said the inflationary risks posed by the war in Iran – and the pressure it poses to mortgage rates and consumer confidence – prove that the government should be able to rely on its domestic construction sector.
The costs facing British construction firms threaten their ability to deliver Labour’s industrial strategy and could put jobs at risk, he said.
Earlier this month, the boss of a leading construction industry body said inheritance tax pressures on material and machinery suppliers, which are often family-run, are putting companies at risk.
Productivity levels are a key indicator of the UK’s economic health and the government celebrated upgrades to these forecasts at last year’s Budget, but Breedon Group warned crumbling infrastructure is hampering productivity growth.
Wood said: “We don’t have enough schools, we don’t have enough hospitals, our road network is in a terrible state of repair, and the government keeps talking about productivity.
“If we don’t have the distribution networks, if we don’t have rail or road networks that are operating efficiently, no wonder productivity can’t improve.”
The FTSE 250 firm released its results for the year to December 2025 on Wednesday and the group saw revenue grow nine per cent to £1.7bn.
But pre-tax profit fell by 16 per cent to £105m, while Breedon reported record post-Covid free cash flow generation of £133m, up 17 per cent from 2024.
The group’s results report noted a “subdued” construction market, with a “dynamic” economic backdrop undermining signs that growth could be recovering.
A spokesperson for the Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government said: “We’re leaving no stone unturned to build the 1.5 million homes this country needs, and we know that to achieve this we need a thriving construction sector.
“This is why we’ve launched major planning reforms and invested billions to make housebuilding quicker, easier and more cost-effective for developers. We’ve also committed £625 million to recruit an extra 60,000 construction workers to get spades in the ground.”