In July, the new Labour Government revealed its plans to almost double the numbers of houses being built in Wokingham Borough. This comes despite our area having built its fair share of new homes for years. Yet Labour isn’t interested in hearing it.
Nationally, there is a need for new housing, something all the major political parties agreed on at the General Election.
Understandably there is demand for housing in our area. Under two decades of Conservative administration, Wokingham Borough was frequently ranked one of the best places in the country to live, work and raise a family.
Labour have said that they want to see house prices become more affordable.
Yet, building more homes has not prevented house prices from continuing to rise in Wokingham Borough and across the Country, even during the recent period of high interest rates.
Just in the last year alone, house prices in Wokingham rose on average by £4,000.
Developers have been able to exploit the planning system, hoarding land while demanding more planning permissions, knowing that their failure to build means councils will have to approve more applications and controlling the supply on new homes coming on the market. In the meantime, some use existing outline planning permissions on land to sell it on for profit – meaning the buyers who then build will charge more for the houses.
When the Conservatives ran the Council, we worked with the then-Conservative Government to introduce a more sensible and sustainable target for new homes for the Borough.
However, since Labour came into Government, they have proposed a radical shake up of the planning system which will leave residents without a say. And they have reintroduced centrally imposed targets.
Labour is proposing not a modest increase, but to double the Borough’s housing target. And while they seek to carpet our communities with inappropriately sized dwellings in the wrong places, they have no plan to force developers to build the houses they already have permission for, or ensure that the necessary infrastructure is in place before the new homes arrive.
There’s another odd feature at the heart of Labour’s plans. Green and rural areas like Wokingham Borough have its targets massively increase. But England’s major cities, particularly London, are having their housing targets decrease. The capital, with its Labour Mayor and many Labour councils, will see the Labour Deputy Prime Minister reduce its annual housing delivery numbers by 20%. Coincidentally, the Prime Minister, Foreign Secretary and Health Secretary all happen to have constituencies where housing targets are now going to reduce. Outside London, other MPs in the Government stand to benefit – for example housing targets will now be reduced in the Leicester constituency of Liz Kendall, who also happens to serve as Labour’s Work and Pensions Secretary.
Labour’s system is political, and broken before it’s even properly started. Instead of putting new houses in areas where demand is high, like big cities, Labour want the houses to go in more rural areas without the local employment or necessary infrastructure to support such significant increases in the local population.
Labour’s political housing targets are currently open to consultation. Wokingham Borough Council will be submitting a reply, and I, on behalf of the Conservative Group, have suggested an addition be made around developers failing to build existing permissions.
At the same time, we’re calling on our local MPs, including the Labour MP for Woodley and Earley, to go back to the Government and tell them to think again.
