“With reports that David Cameron is either dithering or deliberately suppressing the publication of plans to build badly needed new homes it’s no wonder house building is at the lowest level under any peacetime Government since the 1920s. With home ownership falling, rents at record highs and affordable homes built down 26% in the last year, this Tory-led Government’s failings on housing are at the heart of Britain’s cost of living crisis.

 

“Rather than allowing yet another housing announcement to fall to pieces under his watch, the Prime Minister should come clean and publish the report.

 

“Labour has plans to build at least 200,000 homes a year by 2020. The Lyons Housing Commission is working with groups of councils by inviting them to come forward and identify specific locations for development and will set out detailed plans, including  real financial incentives and freedoms for local authorities, to deliver a new generation of New Towns and Garden Cities from the bottom-up.”

 

 

1. Labour has asked the Lyons Housing Commission to set out detailed plans to establish New Towns and Garden Cities. To do this it will:

 

·         Work with groups of local authorities by inviting them to come forward and identify locations capable of sustaining large scale sites for New Towns and Garden Cities;

·         Propose legislation to create New Town Development Corporations (public-private bodies) with the power to acquire and assemble land, raise finance, undertake building and provide the infrastructure needed for development;

·         Set out financial incentives and freedoms for local authorities within the scheme, such as retaining an increased share of business rates for 30 years, to invest in infrastructure and services for the area; and 

·         Propose legislation, in line with the Armitt recommendations, to put New Town Development under the nationally significant infrastructure planning regime (where planning decisions are made by ministers) to ensure co-ordinated and fast tracked decision-making.

 

2. While in the past New Town Development Corporations generated revenue by selling land and housing, receiving rental income and receiving commercial income, they needed up front funding to build the infrastructure and housing which could later be sold at a profit. That is why the Lyons Review will also look at how News Towns and Garden Cities could be underwritten with Treasury guarantees modelled on those currently used for Help to Buy and infrastructure projects to provide cheaper funding.