Councils must produce plans for new homes in their area by 2017 or else the Government will do it for them in consultation with local people, the prime minister has warned.
David Cameron has made it clear that he expects all councils to create and deliver local plans over the next year in order to ensure the Government achieves its ambition of delivering one million new homes by 2020.
According to the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF), councils are required to produce an annual trajectory of how many homes they plan to build in their area over a period of about 15 years. These must be reviewed every five years and local people must have a say on where new developments go and what they look like.
However, while 82% of councils have published local plans, only 65% have fully adopted them. And almost 20% of councils do not have an up to date plan.
The announcement comes just days after the prime minister agreed with housing associations to extend the right to buy to 1.3m additional tenants from next year. And it is being made just before the publication of the Housing and Planning Bill designed to deliver one million new homes over the next five years.
Mr Cameron has also announced that a temporary rule from 2013 that allows people to convert disused offices into homes without applying for planning permission will be made a permanent change.
The prime minister has also launched ‘Own Your Home’, his homeownership campaign, with a brand new online portal to help people find the right home buying scheme for them.
Mr Cameron said: ‘A Greater Britain must mean more families having the security and stability of owning a home of their own. My government will do everything it can to help people buy a place of their own – at the heart of this is our ambition to build 1 million new homes by 2020.’
‘Councils have a key role to play in this,’ he continued, ‘by drawing up their own local plans for new homes by 2017. But if they fail to act, we’ll work with local people to produce a plan for them.’
While welcoming the government’s proactive approach to development, Melanie Leech, chief executive of the British Property Federation, cautions: ‘There are two things that Government must not forget in its headlong pursuit of creating new homes, however. One is that homes for owner occupation are not the only option. The build to rent sector has the potential to deliver a huge number of additional homes and to drive up standards in the rental sector, and must not be disregarded in favour of homes for sale - there is room for both.’
‘The other,’ she continued, ‘is that thriving communities need a mix of amenities to be a success. In order to create places where people want to live, there need to be places for people, to work, shop, and enjoy themselves, and planning policy must reflect that accordingly.’
