Agenda item

Councillor Damian White, Cabinet member for Housing, introduced the report

The report before Cabinet sought Members’ agreement to a direction of travel that would increase the number of units of council houses built within the borough to around 544 over the next three years.  The longer term plan was to deliver over 1,000 units over the next 10 years.

The Council needed to continue to build new affordable homes for local people.  The recent uncertain economy had had an impact on people’s ability to buy and rent homes.  The current Affordable Development Programme budget approved by Cabinet on 11 February 2015 was set to deliver new homes through phases 1 and 2 and Taplow House.  This was projected to deliver a total of 213 units.

Members were informed that a vision for the type of place the borough should be in ten years’ time was essential to lead the implementation of the new build programme for affordable housing development.  This vision would be focused on - and informed by - the borough’s characteristics and the key opportunities and constraints.  That vision was: ‘To build new, good quality homes in Havering that we know local people need and can afford’

Reasons for the decision:

The increased provision of housing, especially social and affordable, was required to meet well documented need/shortfall in supply.

Other options considered:

The option of not increasing provision was considered, but rejected, as it would not begin to deal with lack of housing supply.

Cabinet agreed to:

1.         The principle of a target of homes as outlined in Appendix 2 of the report, and agreed to the expansion of the capital budget for the three years as follows:

·      2015/16 Increase of £3.000m to £13.509m

·      2016/17 Increase of £26.675m to £39.999m

·      2017/18 increase of £19.767m to £28.714m

2.         Refer the increase in the Capital Budget to full Council for final ratification.