It might have been billed the ‘Brexit Election’ but there are now other policies and pledges emerging from the main political parties.

And housing has finally hit the spotlight this week, with three parties offering their vision on how to fix Britain’s broken housing market.

Here’s what’s on offer:

Labour to build council houses

The Labour Party launched its manifesto this week and it had a raft of policies on housing, including:

• To deliver a new social housebuilding programme of more than a million homes over a decade, with council housing at its heart.
• By the end of the Parliament to be building at an annual rate of at least 150,000 council and social homes, with 100,000 of these built by councils for social rent.
• To end right to buy, along with the conversion of social rented homes to ‘affordable rent’.
• To build more low-cost homes reserved for first-time buyers in every area, including Labour’s new discount homes with prices linked to local incomes.
• To introduce a levy on overseas companies buying housing, while giving local people ‘first dibs’ on new homes built in their area.
• To cap rents in line with inflation, and give cities powers to cap rents further.
• To introduce open-ended tenancies to stop ‘no fault’ evictions.
• To get rid of the Right to Rent rules that require landlords to check people’s immigration status.
• To end rough sleeping within five years, with a national plan driven by a prime minister-led taskforce.

Tories look to long-term fixed rates

The Conservatives have yet to launch their manifesto, so there’s less information available, but this week they announced a host of housing measures including:

• Introducing a new 25-year fixed rate mortgage.
• Building at least one million new homes over the next five years.
• Launching a ‘first home’ scheme offering local first-time buyers a discount of up to 30 per cent.
• Lifetime rental deposits for tenants, which they can transfer between properties, making it easier to move from one tenancy to the next.

LibDems announce social rent homebuilding programme

The Liberal Democrats also launched their manifesto this week with the following housing announcements:

• Build at least 100,000 homes for social rent each year and ensure that total housebuilding increases to 300,000 each year.
• Build new houses to zero-carbon standards.
• Devolve full control of Right to Buy to local councils.
• Help people who cannot afford a deposit by introducing a new Rent to Own model for social housing where rent payments give tenants an increasing stake in the property, owning it outright after 30 years.
• Allow local authorities to increase council tax by up to 500 per cent where homes are being bought as second homes with a stamp duty surcharge on overseas residents purchasing such properties.
• Improve protections against rogue landlords through mandatory licensing.