New rules will speed up housing delivery

A consultation has been published by the government outlining plans to help speed up the delivery of new homes by introducing new developer contribution rules.

Several new rules on these contributions, which help fund new roads, schools, play areas and other essential infrastructure, have been proposed. Financial contributions are required from developers where additional public infrastructure is needed to support the building of new homes, with the government’s Community Infrastructure Levy collecting almost £1Bn since it was introduced in 2010.

The new rules form part of a package of reforms to address the lengthy and complex process of negotiation for councils that slows down the delivery of new homes, ensuring the infrastructure needs of communities are identified from the outset, saving time and allowing the provision of infrastructure to be costed in to projects at an early stage.

The consultation takes forward new proposals that will:

• Introduce a new strategic infrastructure tariff, helping fund large-scale projects which benefit multiple communities falling under a combined local authority.
• Widen options on how contributions can be used by councils to benefit their residents, ensuring funds are spent on a wider range of local priorities.
• Increase certainty and transparency by requiring councils to publish details on what has been collected and spent, so communities understand the benefit of development.
• Ensuring the Community Infrastructure Levy responds to changes in land values, ensuring towns and village get the contributions they deserve when planning permission is granted.

Launching the consultation Minister of State for Housing Kit Malthouse MP said: “Communities and developers must know that vital infrastructure needed to support new homes is going to arrive – even before a shovel hits the ground.

“The billions of pounds already paid by developers has been critical in delivering the more, better, faster homes this country so desperately needs, but we must go further.

“These reforms will make the system simpler, transparent and easy to understand and will accelerate the pace of homebuilding – it’s now up to housebuilders and residents to tell us what they think.”

The draft measures, initially announced at the 2018 Autumn Budget, are part of the government’s wide-ranging programme of planning reform and targeted funding to deliver 300,000 homes a year by the mid-2020s.

If you are interested in finding out more about key infrastructure trends today, you may wish to attend the flagship infrastructure exhibition at the NEC in April 2019 : UKIS 2019

Click here for more information on how to register or exhibit at the UK Infrastructure Show 2019.  

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