An Isle of Wight councillor has slammed the fact that only 7.3 per cent of housing created across the Island last year could be classed as affordable.
At a Corporate Scrutiny Committee in Newport yesterday, Cllr Paul Fuller said the situation, evidenced by the council’s planning policy department, was “not good enough” and could be “a lot better”.
Chair of the committee Cllr Clare Mosdell echoed the representative for Cowes West and Gurnard’s concerns:
“I sat through a planning committee and listened to the committee being quite frustrated about a planning application that was going through that was going to be affordable housing.
“But it was a percentage of what those houses were going to be at the market rate – those houses were going to go on the market for £400,000.
“There is no stretch of the imagination that that is going to be affordable for young people on the salaries that they are here.
“It is only affordable if you work it back the other way – what is the average salary for a young couple?
“Can they afford to buy somewhere? Most of the time the answer is no.”
Cllr Fuller added:
“Totally agree. There was a consultation the government had on the new National Planning Policy Framework and one of the comments I made was that we are different on the Island.
“The house prices on the Island are the average within the country. However, our salaries are a lot lower and trying to buy houses is not an option for a lot of people.
“So really our focus needs to be on private renting through housing associations.”
Cllr Geoff Brodie, who represents Pan and Barton, said:
“One of the things I’ve repeatedly asked of the cabinet member (for housing), Cllr Stephens, is for members to have a briefing on the whole concept of affordability, tenure and social housing – I believe there’s a lot of misunderstanding.
“I’d like to see socially rented housing, provided by this council ideally. Portsmouth are doing it and they’ve got the same director of finance as us.”
Housing affordability is one of the council’s six ‘strategic housing priorities’, according to its Isle of Wight Housing Strategy 2020 – 2025 document.
The strategy’s vision for housing is:
“To enable everyone living on the Island to have a place they call home and can live with independence.”
A council spokesperson said:
“The Isle of Wight Council recognises the issues faced and is absolutely committed to the delivery of affordable housing, in line with its Corporate Plan and priorities, and it is doing this in several ways.
“It is permitting new housing, where developers are required to build the affordable housing as part of the planning permission.
“The council can also aid the delivery of affordable housing by increasing the pipeline of affordable houses by making allocations in its local plan.
“The draft Island Planning Strategy, which the council will shortly be submitting to the Planning Inspectorate, would, through the proposed allocations increase the pipeline by facilitating 1,200 new affordable houses.
“Finally, the council is disposing of sites it owns for affordable housing and has successfully applied for grants to deal with some of the exceptional costs on these sites, making the delivery more financially viable.”
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