Planning and Housing minister Lord Falconer has told delegates that the planning system will be changed to ensure that developers make bigger contributions to affordable housing.
Speaking at a fringe meeting on housing at the Labour Party conference on Sunday, Falconer said: “The Three Dragons study, commissioned by Mayor Livingstone in London, proves that planning can pay for it. I cant tell you what amount will come from the Treasury, we will get as much as we can but there are other priorities”
He made it clear that the bulk of the money for affordable housing would come from developers, and not from government subsidies or grants, through proposed changes to Section 106 provision in the forthcoming green paper.
But homelessness charity Shelter estimates that the government will have to deliver an annual subsidy of at least £1.3bn pa to achieve its affordable housing target.
Karen Buck MP, Secretary of the Parliamentary Labour Housing Group, said that it was unlikely that anything like that amount will come from the Treasury.
EGi News 01/10/01
