The leader of the Isle of Wight Council defended his administration’s commitment to housing yesterday, describing it as the “number one priority”.
Speaking to watchdog forum the corporate scrutiny committee, Cllr Phil Jordan said County Hall had “put in place” a “number of measures” demonstrating it was the council’s prime concern.
He told the meeting:
“For a number of years in this administration housing has been our number one priority.
“It’s on the wall upstairs, the chief executive knows that. Getting the houses built is another challenge as we’re all hearing this evening.”
An 11 page report, signed by director of adult social services Laura Gaudion and cabinet member for housing and finance, Ian Stephens, was presented to the comittee, laying out policies the council has taken to deliver affordable and social housing.
Six strategic priorities were set out including new housing supply, defining housing affordability through research, ensuring ‘good quality’ private sector housing and supporting housing associations and other partners build new affordable housing.
Measures also included reducing homelessness and rough sleeping through ‘effective prevention work’ and ensuring specialist accommodation is available for vulnerable people.
The document said:
“This priority (new housing supply) is about ensuring the right supply and mix of new homes is available.
“Including increasing affordable housing delivery through the efficient use of land and capital resources including those the council owns or has control of.
“In 2023/24, over 900 new homes were granted planning permission, with 748 being on large sites (over ten units) that have a policy requirement to deliver 35 per cent affordable housing – this equates to 262 affordable homes being permitted.
“In 2023/24 whilst there were only 19 affordable homes completed (a decrease on the previous three years), there were a further 38 starts on site of affordable homes.”
Cllr Geoff Brodie, representative for Pan and Barton, said:
“Affordable and social housing is one of the main reasons I stood for election to this council nearly 20 years ago.
“The performance of successive administrations over those 20 years has been very poor.”
Cllr Michael Lilley, representative for Ryde Appley and Elmfield, echoed Cllr Brodie’s frustrations:
“We’ve been going round the houses for the last eight years, since I’ve been a councillor, and probably before.”
The presented council report’s figures show 7.3 per cent of homes built on the Island in 2023/24 could be classed as affordable, compared to 18 per cent in 2022/23, 23 per cent in 2021/22, 28 per cent in 2020/21 and two per cent in 2019/20.
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