The Conservative Party has pledged to bar foreign nationals from social housing, claiming that around 230,000 homes would become available under a plan to restrict entitlements to British citizens.
The announcement, made on Thursday evening, marks the sharpest escalation yet in a cross-party contest over who should qualify for a shrinking pool of subsidised homes. The party has not yet published the methodology behind the 230,000 figure, and it remains unclear whether it refers to homes currently occupied by non-UK nationals or to annual new lettings. For context, the total UK social housing stock stands at roughly 5.2 million homes, down from 6.8 million at its peak — meaning the figure would represent between 4% and 5% of all social homes.
Also unclear is whether the policy would apply retrospectively to existing tenants or only to future applicants — a distinction that determines whether the pledge amounts to a change in allocation rules or a mass eviction programme. The party has not said what would happen to households removed from social tenancies, nor whether councils would inherit a homelessness duty and the associated cost of temporary accommodation.
The proposal follows a similar but more far-reaching commitment from Reform UK. On 14 June, Nigel Farage used his first Substack essay to pledge the eviction of all foreign nationals from social housing, offering a three-month grace period to move into private rented accommodation, after which tenants would lose the right to remain and become liable for deportation. That essay, which ran to some 6,800 words, also promised that "veterans and long-term local residents will be preferenced for social housing".
Kemi Badenoch has framed her party's approach around what she calls a "Fairness Test", arguing that Britain should "put British citizens first when it comes to social housing and public services because we believe that charity begins at home and those who have paid in should come first, especially when resources are limited". She has explicitly linked the policy to her position on the European Convention on Human Rights, saying that if legal advice concludes such measures cannot be enacted, "then I will know that we need to leave".
Sir James Cleverly, appointed shadow housing secretary in July 2025, has previously argued that "Labour can promise a building spree, but the OBR's own figures show more than a third of those homes will be absorbed by migration before local families even get a look in". In May, however, he told the UKREiiF conference that Conservatives "must fall in love with social housing again".
Ministers have consistently rejected the premise. The government's standing position is that the vast majority of social homes go to British nationals, with priority given to local people in greatest need, and that people arriving illegally or on student or work visas cannot access social housing at all. A government spokesperson has previously said nearly nine in ten social homes are let to UK nationals.
Housing charities point out that eligibility is already tightly drawn. Non-UK nationals on temporary work or study visas are subject to the No Recourse to Public Funds condition and are ineligible, as are people seeking asylum, and there is no general entitlement to social housing in England — all applicants must qualify under local authority allocation schemes based on assessed need. Because those schemes are set locally, a national ban raises the question of what legislative mechanism would override them.
"These are policies that deliberately conflate nationality, ethnicity and immigration status," said Matt Downie, chief executive of Crisis, responding to the Reform proposal in June. "It is a false narrative that will only serve to stoke division and, if implemented, would increase homelessness."
Around 1.3 million households are on council waiting lists in England, the highest level since 2014. The Local Government Association reported in June that more than 134,000 households were living in temporary accommodation, including over 176,000 children, and that the stock has declined by a net 24,000 homes a year since 1991.
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