"Shocking": Housing Secretary Doesn't Know Number Of Council Houses Built

30 April 2019, 07:50 | Updated: 30 April 2019, 08:15

Iain Dale was left shocked when the Housing Secretary admitted he didn't know how many council houses his government had built.

James Brokenshire was in the LBC studio taking part in Iain Dale's Monday Night News Panel as the topic turned to housing.

Iain asked him how the government was planning to build more houses and the Secretary of State responded: "We need everybody to be building across the board.

"We have seen progress on that. Last year, 222,000 new homes delivered."

When Iain asked him how many of them were social housing, he responded: "There will be a mixture within that."

Liberal Democrat Wera Hobhouse insisted it was just 6,000, but Mr Brokenshire admitted: "I haven't got the specific breakdown of the numbers."

Iain told him: "James, you are Secretary of State for Housing. Should you not know how many of those 222,000 were social housing.

"I'm astonished that you don't know the figures.

"Apart from Brexit, this is the most important government policy and you're sitting there and you can't tell me the figures for council house builds or even affordable housing out of the 222,000.

"I think that's shocking."