Greater Manchester is preparing to ‘turn the tide’ on its housing crisis by building new homes and protecting renters.
Greater Manchester Combined Authority (GMCA) has set out its comprehensive plan to connect communities to new jobs and opportunities, drive up standards across the rental sector, and build new homes – with the latter helping to fulfil its Housing First ambition give everyone access to a ‘safe, secure, and affordable’ home by 2038.
This week has already seen a ‘renewed focus’ on driving up housing standards thanks to the naming of the first supporters of Greater Manchester’s bold new Good Landlord Charter.
New analysis also shows that GMCA’s Brownfield Housing Fund, which was set up in 2020, has already provided grants to deliver more than 15,000 homes, with an average of just over 45% being affordable housing.
But, there’s still a long way to go.
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🏡 Today at #Housing2025, we marked a major milestone: Over 50% of rented homes in Greater Manchester are now covered by the Good Landlord Charter 🎉
— Greater Manchester Combined Authority (@greatermcr) June 26, 2025
GMCA says those recent successes will not stand alone, but rather support plans to deliver more social housing than is lost across the region.
Unlocking brownfield land is what authorities claim is the key to turning the tide on the housing crisis, as since its inception in 2020, as mentioned, Greater Manchester has invested a whopping £135.4 million from the Brownfield Housing Fund to redevelop underused brownfield land, which ultimately delivered thousands of new homes.
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It’s anticipated that further funding allocations will come in the summer to supplement those already approved and in the works.
GMCA is also using the power of Mayoral Development Corporations (MDC) – which are statutory bodies set up by the Mayor Andy Burnham, designed to speed up development and attract investment within a specific area – to unlock regeneration opportunities, as these ‘pioneering’ tools bring together local partners and drive forward the authority’s ambitions to build new homes, bring jobs and investment, and support economic growth.
Authorities are preparing to ‘turn the tide’ on Greater Manchester’s housing crisis / Credit: Benjamin Elliott (via Unsplash)
Some of these MDCs currently include Old Trafford (part of the proposed Western Gateway Mayoral Development Zone), the expanded Stockport MDC, and the Northern Gateway MDC (part of Atom Valley).
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Together, these three alone are expected to deliver 27,250 homes over the next 15 years to help address the housing crisis.
“If we are serious about securing the long-term success of Greater Manchester, we need to free ourselves from the grip of the housing crisis,” commented Mayor Andy Burnham.
“Because of the decisions we’ve taken, Greater Manchester is now building more affordable homes than at any point since the turn of the millennium. We need to keep building on that momentum until we reach a tipping point where we build more social homes than we lose.
“We’re determined to ensure that every person in Greater Manchester has access to the safe and secure home they need in order to thrive.”
Featured Image – James Feaver (via Unsplash)
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NHS to begin offering new one-minute jab to women with ‘aggressive’ form of cancer
Emily Sergeant
The NHS is set to begin offering new immunotherapy for hundreds of women with aggressive cervical cancer across the country.
Pembrolizumab – which experts have described as being able to ‘take the handbrake off’ the body’s immune system to target cancer – will now be presented as a new treatment option for women in England with locally-advanced cervical cancer, which means the cancer has grown beyond the cervix to regions such as the pelvic wall, but not yet spread further around the body.
Trials found that adding pembrolizumab to standard chemoradiotherapy helped keep cancer ‘at bay’ for longer, and improved survival rates overall.
Two years after starting the treatment, nearly seven in 10 patients (68%) were still living without their cancer progressing, compared with 57% for those receiving chemoradiotherapy alone, according to NHS figures.
The trial also found that 82.6% of patients were still alive three years after treatment with pembrolizumab and chemoradiotherapy, compared with 74.8% with chemoradiotherapy alone.
Hundreds of women with aggressive cervical cancer are to be offered a new immunotherapy treatment.
It marks one of the biggest improvements in treatment for the disease in years, and could help more women survive and stay cancer-free in the long term.
The drug is either given every three or siz weeks via an infusion, or as a ‘one-minute’ injection, alongside chemoradiotherapy.
The NHS estimates around 550 patients in England will be eligible for the treatment – which has been approved this week by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) – over the next two years.
Patients will now receive fast-tracked access, funded by NHS England’s Cancer Drugs Fund.
“This is great news for women facing a diagnosis of aggressive cervical cancer, and represents one of the biggest improvements in treatment for this disease in recent years,” commented Professor Peter Johnson, who is the NHS National Clinical Director for Cancer.
“Combining this immunotherapy with existing treatment has had very positive effect for patients in trials, helping the body’s immune system to target cancer more effectively.
“We’re delighted it will be available for patients on the NHS as it could help hundreds more women survive and stay cancer-free in the long-term.”
Featured Image – NappyStudio (via Unsplash)
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Andy Burnham wants to bring the ‘Greater Manchester way’ to Westminster
Emily Sergeant
Andy Burnham has set out his vision for the country if he is to become Prime Minister.
In case you need brining up to speed first, after it was announced earlier this month that Andy Burnham had clinched the victory in the crucial Makerfield by-election, winning 24,927 votes (54.8% vote share) and a majority of 9,231, he then went onto announce his intention to run for Labour Party leader, and therefore Prime Minister, after Keir Starmer confirmed he would be stepping down.
And this week, Mr Burnham has now delivered his first speech as part of his ongoing campaign, addressing how he plans to give the country a ‘new direction’.
Burnham says that he wants to bring the ‘Greater Manchester way’ to Westminster.
A lot has been discussed and reported on when it comes to Burnham’s intentions to create a so-called Number 10 North here in Manchester, but what exactly does it mean to take the ‘Greater Manchester way’ to the capital?
“The Greater Manchester way is based on strong partnership between all sectors: public, private, community, voluntary, academic, faith, and our trade unions,” Burnham said in his speech.
He continued: “When I started as Mayor in 2017, we set about building a new approach, a new politics based on the exact opposite of the Westminster approach.
“Place-first, not party-first. Problem-solving, not point-scoring. Long-term, not short-term.
“A decade on, it’s incredible how much we’ve been able to achieve by working together instead of fighting against one another.”
Burnham said he feels the truth is that the country spends ‘too much time arguing and not enough time doing’ and that for Britain to get back where it ‘should be’, his Government would ask everyone to ‘face the same way’ and then ‘pull in that same direction together’.
He declared that No 10 North will be the ‘nerve centre’ for a rewired Britain.
“It will be the conduit through which we redistribute power and resources across the UK,” he concluded. “It will coordinate all parts of Government, at national and local level, to agree a long-term economic strategy and help all places set new growth ambitions.”
Emily Sergeant -
1st July 2025 
