East Riding Council Exceeds Homebuilding Target

According to government figures released last year, the East Riding of Yorkshire Council exceeded its home-building targets, reports the Pocklington Post.

The council was one out of the 60 per cent of local authorities in England to achieve its targets, leaving 36,000 houses still to be built across the UK. The council built slightly more homes than it was required to in 2018-19, according to figures from the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government.

According to the annual Housing Delivery Test, East Riding of Yorkshire managed to deliver 1,420 homes, with a target of 957 and also showed that the council has managed to sustain this delivery every year since 2016.

Hull has also been praised as one of the UK’s top-performing cities for building new homes after the city doubled its targets over three years. During that period, 2,649 new homes were built, compared to the original target of 1,362.

Councillor John Black, the council's portfolio holder for housing, said: "It is fantastic that Hull has been recognised for this achievement.

"This level of investment shows there is now real confidence in the city and that the council's regeneration strategy us working because Hull is a place where more and more people want to live. I would like to congratulate the council's planning, regeneration and hosing teams who have worked hard to far surpass these targets for home-building.”

However, housing charity Shelter has criticised the government, stating that they have set unachievable housebuilding targets on over-stretched councils” as almost a third of councils failed to achieve their targets.

73 council have been instructed to revisit and revise their plans, and outline 20 per cent more land for development than previously.

Polly Neate, chief executive of Shelter, said: “Slapping unachievable housebuilding targets on over-stretched councils and then penalising them when they can’t fulfil them is not the answer to ending the housing emergency.

“Councils have extremely limited funding and powers to build the homes they’re being asked for. What’s even more ridiculous is that the government’s targets don’t include a requirement to build any social housing, which are the genuinely affordable homes this country is crying out for.”

There were 247,000 new homes built by local authorities in England in 2018-19, which is 9 per cent more than the previous year, with thanks to the councils that delivered more than was required of them.

Though the national totals exceed the Housing Delivery Test’s target, this falls short of the Government’s eventual aim of building 300,000 homes per year by the mid-2020s.

Ms Neate added: “We will never meet the Government’s targets without building social homes – the last time anywhere near 300,000 homes a year were built, councils contributed more than 40 per cent of them.

“To support councils across the country to deliver good-quality housing, we need the Government to provide much-needed investment and reforms to our broken planning system.”

If you need corrugated roofing sheets, then get in touch today.