Rural Local Authorities Raise Concerns Over New Housing Targets

Local councils in some of the UK’s more rural areas have been raising concerns recently that new housing targets are ‘excessive’ and may leave them at the mercy of speculative developers.

The County Councils Network (CCN) have stated that the reintroduction of mandatory targets for councils will likely mean a 56% rise in the number of new houses needing to be built each year, right across England’s more rural regions.

It went on to say that Local Authorities in these areas would need to provide 64,769 new homes a year… with nine out of ten councils telling them that was just too excessive.

The councils most concerned have also raised fears about infrastructure, with mounting pressure on roads, health services, schools and local amenities.

85% weren’t confident that the current planning system would be able to deliver the infrastructure required to support those homes in rural counties.

CCN also raised concerns around the new Governments plans to introduce a ‘five-year land supply, requiring all planning authorities to be able to prove each year that they had enough sites scoped out to deliver five years worth of homes against the targets.

“We recognise the need to build, but these proposals could change the face of many areas in a small space of time, whilst failing to address the core reasons for housing unaffordability. The Government must re-think its proposals, including dropping the five-year land supply and instead making local plans the gold standard for housing decisions. Equally as important, it must not only re-think its housing targets for county areas, but set out ways to effectively capture or deliver more funds for infrastructure.”

Richard Clewer – Housing & Planning Spokesperson – CCN