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Lyons' proposals will 'cost too much', experts warn
A recommendation from a Labour-commissioned review that ‘affordable’ rents reflect local incomes will be too costly and difficult for councils to achieve, experts have warned.
Sir Michael Lyons’ report into housing supply, published last week, calls for the definition of affordable housing to be revised within planning policy to take into account ‘local incomes and house prices’.
Currently, the government’s National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) defines affordable housing as serving households ‘whose needs are not met by the market’ - meaning they are merely required to be sub-market homes.
Councils and housing associations have expressed concern that homes built in high-value areas under the government’s 2011/15 affordable homes programme are unaffordable for tenants because landlords can charge up to 80% of the market rate.
The proposed definition of affordable housing would mean that homes let at 80% market rent in some high-value areas would be considered unaffordable under the NPPF.
Housing sector figures warned that such a move would require councils to undertake household income surveys, which most local authorities have dropped since the recession.
Simon Dow, chief executive of Guinness Partnership, said: ‘Planning authorities are under-resourced, they’re struggling to turn around planning applications promptly, and the idea that they have to do a whole lot of extra work fills me with some alarm.’
Richard Laming, head of economics at planning consultancy Turley Associates, said councils had largely ‘abandoned’ household surveys ‘because it was time consuming, costly, and I think in the financial climate, they couldn’t justify that expense’.
‘If the recommendation from Lyons was implemented it would be a big shift and it would need extra financial resources available,’ he added.
Sir Michael’s report was commissioned by the Labour Party for its policy review and will form a major part of its strategy for housing in the run-up to the 2015 general election.
The review also called for the role of distributing government grant to be handed to the Department for Communities and Local Government, to allow the Homes and Communities Agency (HCA) to focus on disposing public sector land and supporting development.
