Thursday 17 December 2020

GOVERNMENT U-TURN ON HOUSING NUMBERS - BUT NEW TARGET STILL HIGHER THAN THE CORNWALL LOCAL PLAN


"CORNWALL SHOULD BE TAKING ALL DECISIONS ABOUT PLANNING AND HOUSING FOR ITSELF."

The UK Government has announced a rethink of its proposed “standard method for establishing housing requirement figures,” which would have imposed a figure of around 4,000 new properties on Cornwall each year – equivalent to a 20-year housing target of more than 81,000 dwellings.

There will however still be a top-down target from central government, though the formula – described as a “mutant algorithm” by many – has been modified. Figures from the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government released this week suggest that the annual target for Cornwall would now be 2,820 housing units per annum – equivalent to a 20-year housing target of 56,400 new properties.

This is higher than the already high 52,500 figure in the Cornwall Local Plan.

Announcements are still awaited about the other planning changes proposed in the Government's Planning White Paper – which were strongly opposed by Mebyon Kernow.

I have acknowledged the u-turn, but said that it does not go far enough and that the revised housing target would still be too high for Cornwall. 

It remains the view of Mebyon Kernow that the wider proposals in the Planning White Paper should be ditched, and responsibility for all aspects of planning and housing should be devolved to Cornwall – so that communities and politicians to the west of the Tamar can decide what is right for Cornwall.

The above image is of Cllr Matt Luke and Ilooking over the site of the so-called West Carclaze Garden Village - which we opposed for a decade.

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