MP Ed Vaizey has slammed UK housebuilders for developing what he labelled “bland, anonymous and low quality” units and urged companies to embrace off-site technology and big-name designers – like Terry Farrell and Thomas Heatherwick – to build more innovative homes across the country.

As the housebuilding sector grapples with the challenge of meeting ambitious government targets – 300,000 homes a year by the mid-2020s – the Conservative former architecture minister said it was “bizarre” that developers wouldn’t embrace pre-fabrication “when it could allow them to build better, more cheaply and to a higher standard. “I think the public are open to it,” he added.

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