One of the few bright spots in Rachel Reeves’s bleak spring statement was the economic boost the forecasters expect to result from the government’s planning reforms.

Reeves was so delighted to be able to announce some upbeat news, she pinched a phrase from Gordon Brown, calling the resulting extra £3.4bn for public services, “the proceeds of growth”.

Of course, the £3.4bn is imaginary: it’s the Office for Budget Responsibility’s best estimate of the benefits to the exchequer of the slightly larger economy (by 0.2%) it reckons will follow from all that extra housebuilding.

And there is no guarantee of success, for an approach that relies on rewriting regulation from the centre, and exhorting for the private sector to deliver.

But the OBR’s verdict will have real political impact: not just because Reeves can now factor that money into future spending plans; but because it will strengthen the hand of those inside government, pushing for more radical change.

In the longer term, the watchdog suggested, the boost to growth would be larger, at 0.4% – including because workers will be better able to move to more productive jobs, if housing is available nearby.

So far, the OBR has only looked at the changes ministers have already implemented, which included reinstating housing targets. Officials hope the watchdog will eventually “score”, the next wave of reforms, too, including those in the planning and infrastructure bill going through parliament.

These include new national regulation about what types of decision should be delegated to professional planning officers, rather than taken by council planning committees.

Details of how this will work have not yet been pinned down, but the most radical of three options under consideration would mean everything is handed to the planners, aside from a narrow list of cases set by government.

Ministers also intend to use new National Development Management Policies, created by the Conservatives, to establish broad priorities, that could then sometimes override local plans. Labour wants to see more building on unloved “grey belt” land, as well as near train stations.

Anthony Breach, housing and planning expert at thinktank the Centre for Cities, says this combination – national policies, plus the majority of decisions left to planners – would be a big step towards something more like the zoning systems seen in other large economies.

“It would definitely be a more rules-based system,” he suggests – a significant shift away from case-by-case wrangling over months and years, with political debate then shifted to deciding which local areas are appropriate for development.

Piece by piece, then, Keir Starmer’s pre-election promise of backing the “builders, not the blockers”, is taking shape. But as it stands, it has two major gaps in it – not coincidentally, both require the Treasury to loosen the purse strings.

There are 1.3 million people now on a waiting list for social housing, according to Shelter, which is urging the government to commit to creating a “new generation” of social homes.

Labour has made no firm commitment as yet to funding social housebuilding beyond next year, nor set a target of how many such homes it intends to build.

Ahead of Wednesday’s statement, the UK government announced £2.2bn in 2026-27 as a “down payment”, to extend the life of the existing Affordable Homes Programme, while it works up the details of a successor.

Campaigners are urging Labour to make a significant long-term commitment in this summer’s spending review, helping to secure a crucial future income stream for cash-strapped councils in the process.

And this is the second hole in Labour’s approach: councils will inevitably need to be at the heart of the wider housebuilding renaissance – but the plans as they stand lack any convincing mechanism for persuading local people of their benefits.

News that UKGDP may well get a fillip from the unsightly block of flats rising up on that scrubby bit of land round the corner is unlikely to win over many waverers.

Giving local people more of a stake in the upside is not easy, though, within the UK’s centralised tax system, which includes a property levy (council tax) that has been allowed to drift hopelessly out of line with market valuations.

As Gordon Brown said in the Report of the Commission on the future of the UK he produced for Starmer in 2022, “Whitehall and Westminster control around 95% of the UK’s tax revenue, and 75% of the UK’s public spending – a far higher concentration of fiscal power than in any comparable country”.

One aspect of the “take back control” impulse behind Brexit, was what some voters experienced as the rapid transformation of their communities, without having had a say in it.

Of course, the owners of local shops and cafes should benefit from an influx of new customers, and thriving high streets are more pleasant to live near. And local authorities do get to keep a slice of any uplift in business rates.

But without plugging more of the benefits directly back into the local economy, there is a risk that residents lament the arrival of the developers, more than they welcome them.

However, the idea of putting greater tax-raising levers into the hands of local leaders seems just as unpopular in the Treasury as it ever was: Labour’s devolution plans are all but silent on fiscal powers.

Building more homes was already a great idea, before the OBR dropped it into its spreadsheets. But the government could still face a punishing backlash, unless it ensures some of those precious “proceeds of growth” can be felt on the ground, in and around the new housing, not just in the coffers of the Treasury or the profits of developers.