Compared to the average European country, Britain today has a backlog of 4.3 million homes that are missing from the national housing market as they were never built.
[…]
Housebuilding rates in England and Wales have dropped by more than a third after the introduction of the Town and Country Planning Act 1947, from 2 per cent growth per year between 1856 and 1939 to 1.2 per cent between 1947 and 2019.
This has been a key factor behind the UK’s long-standing housing crisis, which has led to inflated property prices and soaring rents in recent decades.
https://www.centreforcities.org/publication/the-housebuilding-crisis/
I don’t deny that there is a shortage, I just think that it’s the lesser (lessor?) problem.