Planning rules are ‘killing off’ small housebuilders, the prime minister has been warned.
A group of almost 200 small and medium-sized firms firms has written to Rishi Sunak, saying they are facing an existential threat to their survival because of government changes to the planning process that have blocked thousands of new developments.
Latest figures show that planning permission approvals have collapsed to their lowest since the 2008 financial crash after a government decision last year to scrap local housing targets.
Some 80% say they are actively considering scaling back or ending their residential construction work. In the letter to Sunak, the firms said that it had “never been more difficult to be an SME developer” and that the government’s present and proposed planning policies were “devastating” the industry.
Stewart Baseley, of the Home Builders Federation, said firms were being “driven out” of the sector by an increasingly “anti-development, anti business policy environment”.
