Sixth housing minister appointed in a year

The sixth housing minister in the past 12 months has been named.

Rachel Maclean, MP for Redditch in Worcestershire, has been appointed to the role following the government reshuffle earlier this week.

She replaces Lucy Frazer, who moved to the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, on Tuesday (7 February) after just three months in the role.

Maclean said: “I’m looking forward to working with everyone on one of the most important issues – housing – facing our country at this time.”

Commenting on the number of post-holders on Twitter, Labour’s shadow housing secretary Lisa Nandy said: “This would be funny if it wasn’t so serious. How can we have any hope of solving a housing crisis when we’ve had 15 housing ministers since 2010 and six in the last year alone!? This is no way to run a serious government.”

Marc Vlessing, chief executive of housebuilder Pocket Living, called for the new minister to encourage building on small brownfield sites.

This would “help rejuvenate the SME sector and contribute to the delivery of thousands of new homes”, he said.

The government has not yet announced a new construction minister – a role it said on Tuesday was “likely” to remain within the newly formed business department.

Nusrat Ghani, holder of the job since late November, was appointed to the new Department for Business and Trade as well as the Cabinet Office this week. Her responsibilities have not yet been announced.

If there is a new construction minister, they will become the 24th postholder since 2001, and the fifth in the last 12 months.