Agenda item

To receive the draft Housing Strategy for 2025 – 2030.

The Deputy Leader and Cabinet Member: Highways, Housing & Enforcement presented the Draft Housing Strategy 2025–2030.

The draft Strategy set out the Council’s vision for delivering high-quality, sustainable and affordable housing across the Borough over the next five years.

Since the adoption of the Council’s last strategy, and in line with national trends, the Council had seen a number of changes in the Borough’s population including a 13.5% population increase between 2013 and 2023. Residents had faced a number of challenges include the cost of living crisis and a rise in energy prices, which had disproportionately affected lower-earning households. There had also been a significant increase in the number of people presenting to the Council as homeless and requiring housing support and a noticeable trend in the number of landlords exiting the housing market due to financial pressures and anticipated policy reforms.

Developed in conjunction with partners, housing providers and community organisations and building on the achievements of the previous Strategy, the draft Strategy maintained its core objectives to create sustainable and inclusive communities, making best use of existing homes and supporting the most vulnerable residents whilst responding to new challenges such as rising energy costs and increased housing demand.

The draft Strategy also outlined an emphasis on the importance of partnership working, detailing plans to tackle homelessness, improve housing standards and support climate action through low-carbon housing initiatives. The Council would continue to bring long-term empty homes back into use, supporting landlords and tenants through the Better Homes for All Programme and investing in energy efficiency and retrofitting to help residents reduce bills and carbon usage. Through the Local Plan, the Council would look to deliver 20,000 new sustainable and accessible homes by 2040 and efforts would also be made to address stalled sites and drive estate regeneration where it was most needed. The draft Strategy would also continue to provide homes that supported and empowered the Borough’s most vulnerable residents, including care leavers, veterans, people with disabilities and those fleeing domestic abuse.

Subject to approval by the Cabinet, the draft Strategy would proceed to public consultation for a period of 6 weeks. Engagement would be undertaken during this period with key lived experience groups such as care leavers before being brought back for final approval and adoption.

Cabinet Members welcomed the report highlighting how a good quality and secure home is fundamental to residents’ wellbeing. Members praised the Council’s increasingly proactive role in housing, noting the significant achievements made since the adoption of the previous strategy, including bringing over 300 empty homes back into use, improving energy efficiency and addressing issues such as damp and mould. Members commended the creative reuse of historic buildings and high street spaces for housing, as well as the preventable measures put in place for over 4,000 people at risk of homelessness.

The Conservative Group Leader expressed his support for providing residents with access to a secure and affordable home. He welcomed the strategy’s focus on making better use of existing housing stock and the Council’s continued efforts to address homelessness. However, he raised concerns in relation to the strategy’s second objective which focused on creating green, connected and sustainable communities and asked the Council to consider the sustainability of building 8,000 new homes on greenfield land as part of the Local Plan, citing population data included within the report highlighted that the majority of the population growth came from people moving into the Borough rather than natural change. He stated that building such developments on areas of urban sprawl and disconnected estates undermined the Council’s goal of creating sustainable communities.

The Cabinet Member: Neighbourhoods, Planning & Sustainability highlighted that many residents had chosen to move to the Borough for its quality of life and strong employment opportunities and that welcoming new residents is a natural and positive part of community growth. The Cabinet Member also addressed concerns about the Local Plan, highlighting that the consultation period had closed however she hoped that any objections to the draft proposals had been submitted, including detailed alternatives for consideration. It was stated that many housing allocations within the Borough had already been built on brownfield land, such as the Station Quarter development.

RESOLVED that – the launch for consultation of the Council’s draft Housing Strategy 2025 – 2030, included at Appendix 1 of the report be approved.