A Labour shadow cabinet member says there needs to be assurances on “genuinely affordable housing” when Lichfield District Council draws up a new Local Plan.
The Conservative leadership group will discuss a proposal to withdraw the existing document at a cabinet meeting next week after the Tories said it was no longer suitable.
It will mean the council would need to go back to the drawing board in order to set out proposals for future housing development across the district.
Labour opposition group leader Cllr Sue Woodward said her party would not oppose the withdrawal, but insisted they would seek “assurances” on key issues in future.
Cllr Colin Ball, the Labour shadow cabinet member for placemaking and housing, said it was clear why the Local Plan had needed to be withdrawn.
“Sue is absolutely right in all that she said on Lichfield Live recently about this.
“Reading between the lines of the cabinet report, I see a clear implication that the emerging Local Plan 2040 would not be accepted as ‘sound’ by the Planning Inspectorate, risking the Council having no Local Plan at all in place after 2029 – and creating open season for developers to build whatever they want wherever they want.
“So, as Sue has said, although we are far from happy about this and have a number of concerns, we really have no choice but to accept the proposed withdrawal.
“In fairness, the cabinet report does mention the risks associated with withdrawing the emerging Local Plan 2040, although it doesn’t – as far as I could see – mention that the position would be much worse on this if we do not have a sound Local Plan in place by the end of our current Local Plan period in 2029.
“I have already raised my concerns on this with my cabinet opposite number, Cllr Alex Farrell, and also with the relevant staff at the council.”
Cllr Colin Ball, Lichfield District Council
The Local Plan outlines things such as the proposed direction of housebuilding across the district over the next 15 years.
But Cllr Ball said he hoped to see improvements in this area on any new draft.
“The other issue that I didn’t see mentioned in the cabinet report is the affect that the withdrawal of the emerging Local Plan would have on much needed affordable rented housing across our district.
“One significant improvement in the emerging Local Plan 2040 on this in my view was a requirement of a minimum of 20% affordable housing on brownfield and strategic sites and 30% on greenfield sites. I championed this through the Local Plan sub-committee that I served on over the last council term.
“This was a major improvement on the position in the current Local Plan, where the stated position is ‘up to 40% affordable housing’, which may look good on paper, but nowhere near this has ever been achieved to my knowledge over the plan period to date. Indeed, I don’t think that we’ve ever even reached 20%.
“This is all down to what I see as a get out clause in the current Local Plan around financial viability of delivering this for the developers. I have also raised my concerns on this with the relevant staff at the council.
“I will be asking for assurances that there will be minimum levels of genuinely affordable housing required – ideally rented social housing – in any new Local Plan, not the current nonsense Tory government definition of affordable housing at 80% of market rents, which we all know is not affordable for very many people at all.”
Cllr Colin Ball, Lichfield District Council
