ABSTRACT
When Harold Macmillan took office in October 1951, his first objective was to raise substantially the annual number of housing starts, predominantly in the local authority and speculative sectors, until they attained the Conservatives’ 300,000 target for Britain. Private housebuilding starts and completions both increased rapidly. The upward trend was maintained for more than a decade with the number of units completed curving through its maximum in the years 1964-8. Thus the period of Conservative power which came to an end in 1964, largely coincides with the second boom since 1918 in construction for home-ownership. Two further aspects of state policy towards owner-occupation should be mentioned here. The first concerns the sale of council houses, the second the new building by-laws. The second policy development was the introduction in 1953 of a new set of model building by-laws, the first since 1937.
