20 COMMENT
Paul Smith, managing director of The Strategic Land Group
THE STANDARD METHOD SEES NORTHERN CULL IN HOUSING TARGETS
Paul Smith of The Strategic Land Group, says that the standard method introduced for calculating local housing targets has let to a detrimental reduction in those targets across the north of England.
THE INDUSTRY WARNED THAT THE FORMULA CHOSEN WOULD RESULT IN PRECIPITOUS DECLINES IN TARGETS
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hen the Government introduced the standard method for calculating Local Plan housing targets, it was a welcome attempt to simplify the process. Far too much time was being spent at Local Plan examinations and even at planning appeals debating different methodologies and what they meant for housing targets. However, the development industry warned
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that the formula chosen by the Government – which focused solely on affordability ratios and ignored economic growth objectives – would result in precipitous declines in housing targets across the North of England, undermining attempts to rebalance the economy. Those warnings fell on deaf ears, with the Government insisting that there was nothing to worry about. National policy, they asserted, made clear
the new targets were minimum figures – local authorities were free to pursue higher housing
targets if they wished. The Government’s expectation was that councils would take that opportunity. We’re beginning to see how wrong they were. In January, the Greater Manchester Combined Authority (GMCA) published an updated draft of the Greater Manchester Spatial Framework (GMSF), a mayoral plan covering all 10 of the local authorities in the region. The revised plan reduced the housing target by 26,000 homes on the basis of the standard method calculation. Such was the GMCA’s commitment to reduc- ing the housing target, that they walked away from £68m in Government funding that had previously been promised through a housing package in return for the region planning to deliver the original, higher housing target. Across the Pennines in Leeds the picture is similar. In 2014, Leeds City Council (LCC)
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