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A plea made nearly six months ago from Maidstone council for lowering of housing targets is still to receive a response from the Government.
In a letter signed by council leaders and MP Helen Grant in January, to Robert Jenrick, Secretary of State for Housing, concerns were raised about the ongoing Local Plan Review process.
When the local authority agreed its Local Plan, a blueprint for development, in 2017, it had set aside space for building 882 homes a year.
However, the introduction of a new formula, the Standardised Methodology for Assessing Need, calculates Maidstone will soon need to increase that number annually to 1,236, up by 40%.
Council chiefs asked that the current 882 target is maintained until the end of the Local Plan period in 2031, arguing the increase has “eroded community trust in the plan making process” and there is an emerging “housing delivery threat”.
A meeting was requested with Mr Jenrick but, months later concerns have gone unanswered, deemed “wholly unacceptable” by Cllr Martin Cox, leader of the council, in a pointed follow-up letter sent last week.
MP Helen Grant got in touch in February, with civil servants apologising in April, saying they had not received the letter.
It was resent and a June 30 deadline given for a response.
Cllr Cox said now is the time for a “sensible conversation" about housing numbers and the timing of the review.
He went on: “Our motivations and aspirations will be around finding solutions which meet the borough’s housing and growth needs, but not at the expense of either good spatial planning or the environment. This topic is of significant interest.”
Speaking to Kent Online, Cllr Cox said it felt as if the Government was ‘ignoring’ the local’s authority attempts to examine housing numbers in the area.
He said he didn't think the Department for Housing, Communities and Local Government would agree to keep the current housing target until 2031 but he hoped to “negotiate” the numbers down.
He went on: “I want to show him [Robert Jenrick, Secretary of State] that it isn’t a one size fits all.
"He’s got to listen to the local outcry of people saying ‘this is too much’, and to the developers saying ‘I don’t know if we can deliver at that pace.’”
“It would be ridiculous for us to think they are ignoring us, which was the feeling we were getting.”
The Government is being driven by its goal of building 300,000 homes a year by the mid-2020s, rather than looking at the actual needs of specific area, he added.
Council leaders said earlier this year it “would seem improbable” that housebuilders would want to raise their targets by 40% and Cllr Cox said the pandemic could mean less people are able to buy homes.
The council continues to progress with the Local Plan Review, which is due to complete in 2022.
