Worcester City Council welcome proposed changes to how housing targets are calculated

The government want to reform the National Planning Policy Framework

Author: Elliot BurrowPublished 27th Sep 2024

The leader of Worcester City Council says the plan to build more affordable houses in the area is an important one.

It comes as the council have welcomed the government's proposals that would see a change into how housing targets for the area are calculated, which would see figures produced for each local authority district.

This means it would then be up to each council to determine how and where it will meet that figure, and would see an annual increase of 241 houses being built.

Lynn Denham says additional houses being built would be useful.

She said: "The main reason why this is needed for is there are too many people living in poor accommodation.

"Within Worcester city, we have more than 3,000 people on the housing waiting list, and a number of those are living in what is labelled as poor accommodation, so the key thing going forward is more homes which are affordable.

"In order to deliver housing development, you need designers, architects, you need plumbers, so it creates job opportunities as well, which will be part of the economic development going forward."

The existing method calculates a housing need of 343 houses to be provided each year, but under the new system it would see that figure rise to 584.

First for all the latest news from across the UK every hour on Hits Radio on DAB, at hitsradio.co.uk and on the Rayo app.