Call to focus on rural housing in new homes plan

CLA - Country Land and Business Association Limited logo

The CLA in the North is urging government to ensure rural housing delivery forms a vital part of its plans to accelerate home building.

The call comes in response to plans set out by the Prime Minister and the Chancellor to accelerate house building over the next five years, which will form part of the Housing Bill to be introduced in the Autumn.

CLA North Regional Director Dorothy Fairburn said: “The delivery of affordable properties in rural areas has been woeful. If people are not able to live and work in the countryside, local communities and the rural economy will continue to suffer.

“Many rural landowners want to deliver good, affordable housing in their local areas but they are thwarted by planning authorities and their over restrictive interpretation of national planning rules.”

According to the CLA, many landowners have also fallen foul by providing housing associations with low cost land for affordable housing only to see the homes being sold off in to the open market.

Miss Fairburn added: “Local authorities must to be proactive in assessing housing need in rural areas and be forced to bring forward up to date local plans at the same time.

“A thriving countryside needs delivery of a planning regime which encourages landowners to bring land forward housing and ensures that planning authorities cannot turn down good affordable housing proposals on spurious grounds.”