when the coalition government came to power in 2010, capital investment in new affordable homes was cut by 60%, while government-imposed caps on local authority borrowing continued to restrict their ability to raise money to build new homes. writing in "inside housing", former housing minister john healey observed that rate of starting social rented schemes had declined from 40,000 in 2009/10 to less than 1,000 in 2015/16. when the government eventually released its "affordable homes programme" for 2011-2015 and accompanying funding guidelines it established a new type of affordable housing- "affordable rent" that can be up to 80% of the market rent and hence at levels that can be significantly higher than social rents, and affordable rents are around 30% higher than social rents on average among housing association properties. the provision of affordable rent is meant to compensate for the drastically reduced central government subsidy for new social housing (an average of £20,000 per home in 2012 versus £60,000 per home under the previous national affordable housing programme 2008-2011), allowing housing associations and local authorities to raise more revenue from rent payments to be used for long-term capital investments.