WARRINGTON is the 10th worst unitary authority in England for delivery of affordable homes, the borough council will be told next week.
A motion to be put to the council on Monday by Liberal Democrat leader Cllr Bob Barr will condemn the council’s recent record as “very poor.”
By contrast, Warrington’s neighbours, Cheshire East Council and Cheshire West and Chester Council (CWaC) are the fourth and fifth best, respectively.
The number of affordable homes delivered in Warrington in 2017-18 was 43.
In Cheshire East it was 613 and in CWaC it was 554.
The previous year, Warrington’s figure was 78 compared with 442 in Cheshire East and 499 in CWaC.
Over the last six years the figures, from the Local Government Association, show that in almost every year, Warrington has delivered significant fewer affordable homes than the other two authorities.
Cllr Barr, calling for an affordable homes strategy for Warrington, accepts that the borough council is not short of aspirations to deliver the right homes in the right places at the right price.
He says: “However, these aspirations are scattered across a wide range of policies from different directorates covering planning, Local Plan, investment and housing.
“There is no single succinct policy document on the delivery of affordable housing. It is not clear who is responsible for our affordable housing strategy either among officers or in the Cabinet.”
The Liberal Democrat leader urges the council leader to instruct the chief executive to establish a “task and finish” group to produce an affordable housing strategy which can be implemented and
monitored.
“The group should produce a report which covers the following topics, and any others that they deem necessary – need, affordability, deliverability, funding, special needs, location, tenure mix, planning constraints and the effect of viability assessments.”
The group should provide an interim report to council no later than April 30 next year, Cllr Barr suggests.
1 Comment
WBC had an affordable housing policy – My role was to help implement it and I challenged developers regularly to deliver in accordance with the policy and planning policy – constantly got over ruled in favour of section 106 cash contributions and then my job was made redundant 4 years ago to save money! This, together with the Government’s every changing definition of what actually constitutes affordable housing means most people on average incomes still cannot afford it .