LibCon Cuts threaten huge slump in affordable homes
Tony Gosling
tony at cultureshop.org.uk
Sun Jun 13 19:10:42 BST 2010
Guardian coverage of Bilderberg 2010: Between the sword and the wall
The Catalan police are refreshingly friendly. But
if the time for action comes, whose side will they be on?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/jun/05/bilderberg-2010-charlie-skelton
Cuts threaten huge slump in affordable new homes, housing associations warn
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2010/jun/13/cuts-threaten-affordable-new-homes
Changes to planning system will hit social housing
Crisis could create a rift in Conservative-Lib Dem coalition
*
<http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/jamiedoward>Jamie
Doward and
<http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/tobyhelm>Toby
Helm - <http://observer.guardian.co.uk>The Observer, Sunday 13 June 2010
*
[]
Housing associations are warning that not
enough new homes will be built at affordable prices.
Housebuilding in Britain will "fall off a cliff"
this year due to a "catastrophic" combination of
financial cutbacks and changes to the planning
system, the government was warned last night.
The National
<http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/housing>Housing
Federation, which represents England's housing
associations, predicted the most vulnerable in
society will be the hardest hit, with the number
of affordable homes built this year in England
slumping by as much as 65%, to 20,390. This would
be the lowest number of affordable homes built
since 1990, with profound consequences for the
4.5 million people on waiting lists across the country.
The federation said the private sector would also
be affected and expressed fears the total number
of homes that will be built this year in England
would fall below the 100,000 mark, the lowest
level for almost a century. Similar problems are
predicted for Wales and Scotland.
The previous government estimated there was a
need to build a minimum 250,000 homes a year to
reach a target of 3m new properties by 2020 if an
acute housing crisis is to be alleviated.
"The prime minister and deputy prime minister
have repeatedly said public spending cuts will
not disproportionately hit the most vulnerable,
but if these measures go ahead the impact on
housebuilding will be catastrophic," warned the
federation's chief executive, David Orr.
Any failure to tackle the housing crisis would
threaten a major rift between the coalition
partners. Simon Hughes, the Liberal Democrat
deputy chairman, has made the issue a top
priority, asking Cameron for assurances that the
new government "would do better than Labour in building affordable housing".
But the federation said the crisis would worsen
if the government did not urgently reconsider its
policies. It claimed the decision to scrap
regional housebuilding targets, without replacing
them with an alternative system, would leave
councils free to reject all new social housing developments.
Orr has written to the housing minister, Grant
Shapps, urging the government to honour spending
commitments on new housing schemes during this
financial year and to halt the proposed changes to the planning system.
In the letter, seen by the Observer, he states:
"If the government fails quickly to replace the
regional planning mechanism it has just scrapped,
the building of affordable homes could
potentially grind to a halt this year with all
housebuilding
falling off a cliff."
Shapps warned last week that around 150 social
housing projects were under threat because of a
£610m "black hole" inherited from the last
government. The coalition has already announced a
£100m cut from the National Affordable Housing
Programme, which will see plans to build another 1,453 social homes axed.
Housing associations typically fund 60% of the
cost of affordable homes, with the remainder met
by grants. Many associations have invested
heavily in developing sites but now face the
prospect of the promised money being withdrawn.
Experts warn the sector faces a double blow as a
result of proposed changes to the planning
system. Around 40% of affordable homes are
delivered through "planning gain agreements",
whereby developers are given permission for
housing schemes if they agree to build some
social housing on the sites. But the government
is considering scrapping the agreements, a move
the federation said would lead to around 19,000
social homes being axed this year.
"The slashing of front-line funding means big
cuts to the numbers of new affordable homes,"
said John Healey, shadow minister for housing and
planning. "But it is also linked to changes to
the planning system that will strengthen the
Nimby tendency. This, of course, means fewer
homes, even where they are badly needed and demand is obvious."
Campbell Robb, chief executive of Shelter, warned
that any curtailment in the construction of
affordable housebuilding would have wide
ramifications: "It will have a huge impact on
people's jobs and economic growth and will weaken
our capacity to build homes in the future as skills are lost."
But Shapps defended the decision to axe regional
targets. "Houses cannot be built by targets that
don't work with money that doesn't exist," he
said. "We have the lowest peacetime rate of
housebuilding since 1924 and top-down control
that alienates the public and undermines support for new housing."
He pledged the government would introduce
incentives for developments and promised to make
£170m available to build 4,000 unfunded, social
rented homes this year, safeguarding around 3,500 jobs.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2010/jun/13/cuts-threaten-affordable-new-homes
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