Plans to drop house building targets won’t change Barnsley Council’s housing plans for now says leader

The Prime Minister announced that mandatory house building targets for councils will be overturned this week, to be replaced with advisory targets which would give councils more control.

Sixty Conservative MPs called for the mandatory target to be scrapped, in an amendment to the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill.

The Bill is expected to return to the Commons next week.

The Conservatives’ manifesto pledge to build 300,000 houses a year meant that Barnsley Council aimed to build 21,546 homes before 2033.

Barnsley Council’s leader says the announcement “doesn’t change anything compared with the existing situation” and it will be a “long time” before changes are seen at a local level.

Councillor Sir Steve Houghton CBE, leader of Barnsley Council, told the local democracy reporting service: “We have ambitious targets to create more and better jobs for our residents and to grow our economy. This means we must also create new, warm, sustainable homes for our residents in the future.

“The announcement regarding house building targets doesn’t change anything compared with the existing situation.

“These reports merely relate to the content of the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill and until it becomes an Act of Parliament, it has no bearing on how things work. Even if it is enacted, it is likely that secondary legislation will be needed to set out how things will work in practice.

“It will therefore be quite a long time before we are able to say what the impacts of any changes are at a local level.”