Ex-Housing Secretary urges govt to ‘stick with’ planning reforms

Robert Jenrick MP, who was recently removed from his role as Housing Secretary in September’s cabinet reshuffle, has “strongly” warned the prime minister against “bottling” proposals to reform planning laws to enable more house building.

Mr Jenrick told BBC Radio 5 Live’s Newscast podcast that the government’s 80-seat majority meant it was in a position to confront complex issues, such as housing.

He went on to say that: “Housing is one of those areas where you can make a huge difference, helping people onto the housing ladder, reducing the cost of living, increasing productivity, helping small businesses.”

“It cuts across all of the government’s priorities, so I strongly, strongly urge the prime minister to stick with it.”

In his keynote address to the Conservative Party conference in Manchester on Wednesday, Boris Johnson said the government would end declining property ownership among young people by building more houses in England, but failed to lay out any new policy proposals on the matter.

The government has previously said it will build 300,000 new homes annually in England.

However, it said in a blueprint published last summer, this can only be done if the current guidelines- where local planning officials assess applications case-by-case – are replaced by a new regime in which councils would be required to plan for a proportion of homes out of the number pledged nationally, and would have to classify all land in their area as “protected”, for “renewal”, or for “growth”, which ministers claim will speed up developments.

In June, the Conservatives lost the Chesham and Amersham by-election to the Liberal Democrats partly over concerns regarding more house building in the area.