Report of the Executive Member for Growth, Councillor Gordon Bambridge.

Gordon Bambridge, the Executive Member for Growth presented the report which concerned proposed amendments to the Council’s Housing Allocations Policy.

Breckland Council’s current Housing Allocations Policy was last reviewed and adopted by the authority in 2016.  The Policy sets out who was eligible to apply for housing and then set out an approach to the prioritisation of eligible households.

The Council’s current Housing Allocations Policy stated that affordable housing within the Breckland district be ring-fenced for households with a local connection to the District as a whole, and that priority for housing be awarded to local households in the highest housing need.  The only exception to this was for homes developed on ‘exception sites’, whereby homes were developed on small sites in response to the identification of a locally rising need for additional affordable housing.  In this scenario, homes built on exception sites were typically prioritised for households with a connection to the parish where the homes had been built, over and above those who did not have a connection to the parish.

Separately to the processes relating to the housing allocations, a number of local communities across Breckland were developing Neighbourhood Plans.  As Members were aware, the Neighbourhood Planning process had been developed by Government as a means of providing local communities with the opportunity to shape development in their areas.  It was common place for Neighbourhood Plans to include policies on matters relating to design, amenity space and the location of development with settlements.  However, an increasingly common ask by local communities developing Neighbourhood Plans was for a proportion of affordable housing delivered on sites allocated by the District Council (through the Local Plan process) to be prioritised for households with a local connection to that specific development area featured within Neighbourhood Plans related to affordable housing.

The amendment, if adopted, would enable additional preference to be given to applicants with a local connection to the parish, rather than just the District, in relation to sites being allocated over and above those already allocated in the District Council’s Local Plan.

The proposed amendment to the Council’s Housing Allocations Policy had been considered previously by the Overview & Scrutiny Commission at its meeting on 8 November 2018.  Following a detailed discussion, Members requested that Officers returned to a future meeting as a means of providing clarity on a number of points raised by the Committee.  The two key points raised had been as follows:

·        That further consideration be given as to whether the policy amendment should be amended in order to enable the parish local connection requirement to apply to lettings ‘in perpetuity’ – as opposed to simply applying on ‘first let’.

·        Whether it would be possible to apply a parish local connection requirement to all sites in all parishes in the District, regardless of whether a Neighbourhood Plan was in place.

Councillor Bambridge advised that having given further consideration to the Policy, it was now being proposed that the Policy proceed to public consultation on the basis of the  ...  view the full minutes text for item 12

Report of the Executive Member for Growth, Councillor Gordon Bambridge.

The Executive Member for Growth introduced the report and invited the Executive Manager for Growth to present the report in greater depth to Members.

Members were informed that the current housing allocations policy was structured in a way that affordable housing within Breckland was ring-fenced for households with a local connection to the District and priority for housing was awarded to local households in the highest housing need. The only exception to that was where homes were built on ‘exception sites’, which were typically prioritised for households with a connection to the parish where the homes had been built.

Separately to the processes relating to housing allocations, a number of Parishes across the District were developing Neighbourhood Plans.  As a result local communities were asking for a proportion of affordable housing delivered on sites allocated through the local plan process to be prioritised for households with a local connection to that specific settlement.  However, there were a number of legal impediments that made it difficult for the District Council to support this approach, mainly a legal requirement to allocate affordable housing to those in highest need.

The Chairman asked if applications were received on a local need first could the second let be to anyone across the District.  It was confirmed that this was how the Policy would be applied if agreed, but there would be scope to extend this beyond first let if members were minded to support that approach. 

The Executive Member for Growth suggested that the proposed policy would satisfy a current need, however it was recognised that the Council would need to consult on any policy changes ahead of implementing any changes. 

Councillor Oliver queried ring-fenced for the first let, but not for the second, and questioned if this was a legal requirement. The Executive Manager for Growth set out that the proposal for the ring-fence to apply only on first let was a proposed approach, but a policy choice open to the Council. Councillor Oliver enquired as to why the policy could not apply in areas where neighbourhood plans were not being developed. The Executive Manager for Growth set out that the legal advice received by the authority was clear that applying local ring-fences on sites allocated to meet district-wide need carried with it a high risk of successful legal challenge from households who would be disadvantaged through such a policy, including those to whom the Authority had a statutory duty to award higher priority, such as households that were owed a duty under homelessness legislation. The Executive Manager for Growth set out that the approach proposed within the paper carried with it a substantially lower risk of successful challenge.

The Executive Manager added that the issue had been explored in external legal advice.  Under the current Housing legislation, the Council has a statutory duty to provide a reasonable preference to households.

Councillor Dimoglou felt that we should encourage people to buy through shared ownership. 

Councillor Wilkinson said he had experience of housing local people  ...  view the full minutes text for item 124