Housing Green Paper will repeat the 'Mistakes of the Past" - Took
July 25, 2007 6:10 PM
The recently released Housing Green Paper has confirmed that the government has not ruled out more development on flood plains as part of its plans for three million new homes by 2020.
The Green Paper says councils should get Environment Agency advice on the flood risk of new developments. Housing Minister Yvette Cooper also invited bids for five new "eco towns" and said, from 2016, all new homes would have to be "zero carbon".
Responding to the publication of the Housing Green Paper Liberal Democrat parliamentary spokesman for Ashford, Chris Took said;
"The Green Paper repeats the same Labour led cowboy housing policies of the past decade. Addressing the housing crisis needs vision and ambition, yet the only thing the Government has done is give all its failed ideas a fresh lick of paint.
"There are still 1.6 million households waiting for council housing. The Government should let all councils, including Ashford, get on with providing the social housing their communities need, rather than only allowing a select few.
"Young people are being encouraged to mass multiply their incomes to get on the housing ladder. This country though does not need more debt, it needs more affordable homes that remain affordable in the future.
"The Government should be promoting community land trusts which ensure homes do remain affordable; a first step would be to hand over surplus public sector land to them.
"Imposing house building figures on local communities hasn't worked in Ashford and there's no reason to think it can now. Instead the Government should be changing the incentives for local communities. If our community got more out of developments then we would be more willing to consider them."
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