Basildon and Castle Point councils fail to build enough houses

Properties on new estates are selling before they’re even built and estate agents report dozens of people chasing homes on the market.

So what’s the answer? Building more new homes in appropriate places to meet that demand.

But it seems our councils are stalling in meeting their new homes quota.

Castle Point Council, for example, has consistently failed to meet its target over the past five years.

The council, which has been set a target of 285 per homes per year, has failed to hit that number every year since 2010.

Campaigners fear the failure to see new homes built on appropriate sites would developers would use that as an excuse to force through homes on cherished green belt land in the borough.

Out of the 1,425 homes the council should have seen built since 2010, under Government targets in the absence of a Local Housing Plan, just 575 have been completed.

Basildon Council seen about 451 houses built under its targets over the past six years.

Jacqui Thornton, from the Friends of Bowers Road Green Belt group, said: “Developers will look to take advantage of Castle Point not hitting its housebuilding targets – there are two examples of it already in Glebelands and Jotmans Farm, both of which went to appeal.

“I think the housing targets set already are unfair. We have not got the infrastructure in place to take this amount of housebuilding.”

Basildon Council’s target, set by the Government in 2008, asked it to find space to build 535 homes per year.

While large scale developments on the likes of Gloucester Park, as well as planned estates on Dry Street and land near Ballards Walk, have added, or will add to the numbers, the authority has still failed to hit its targets.

The Government has threatened councils like Basildon, warning that if they do not produce a Local Plan, which pinpoints development of new homes, Whitehall will carry out the work itself.

Basildon Council has failed to get its Local Plan off the ground since 2003, because of a serious of hitches at the Government’s fault, with Whitehall “changing the goalposts”, according to Tory council leader Phil Turner.

He hinted at a reduction in the 16,000 homes proposed in the last incarnation of the plan, which was shelved for more research last year, and added: “The Local Plan will fairly distribute homes across the borough, and the rhetoric coming out of the opposition that this isn’t the case is simply untrue.

“This Local Plan will provide jobs and employment to be people.”

But Mike Andrews, from Billericay Action Group, had previously raised concerns about 2,500 homes planned in Billericay.

He said: “The issue is not the number – it’s whether the sites were suitable for housing, bearing in mind a lot of our roads are already at max capacity and we need to think about schools and doctors’ surgeries in the areas too.

“But I’m sure those concerns would be in the same in Basildon and Wickford too.”

Southend Council, which gave itself a target of 320 homes per year in its Core Strategy, has seen an average of 336 homes built per year.

Rochford District Council has to build 250 homes as set out in its Local Plan, but refused to tell the Echo how many homes it had built over the last five years.

But campaigners believe the figure, which was 160 homes when the Government set it before it was superseded by the controversial Local Plan, is too high and the council is already building exceeding its yearly target.

South Essex is the wrong place for a “garden city”, according to campaigners.

Last year, Basildon Council and Brentwood Council announced it was looking into a joint plan to put a garden city of between 4,000 and 6,000 homes called the Dunton Garden Suburb, on lend west of Laindon.

Despite opposition from local residents and prominent politicians, the proposals could still form part of Basildon’s Local Plan, to take the pressure of housebuilding in the new town, Wickford, Pitsea, and Billericay.

And as part of the Essex’s lobbying to the Government for devolved powers, the county’s pitch to Whitehall says that it needs to ramp up housebuilding, and could look to garden city developments.

In a joint letter signed by all leaders, it says: Our ambition is that by 2025, with a devolution deal in place, we will have further improved the rate and reliability of housing delivery to meet local housing plans, by promoting a targeted number of locally identified large-scale developments, including those on garden settlement principles.”

But Mike Andrews, from the Billericay Action Group, said: “We’re already the most densely populated area of Essex, so they need to look at the bigger picture and ask, is this sensible?

“It makes sense for Brentwood Council to want to build as far as way from Brentwood as possible, just like we saw Chelmsford Council stick 600 homes on the former Runwell Hospital site, which will affect Wickford and Basildon, not Chelmsford.”

Rochford District Council has “sold its residents a puppy”, according to a prominent campaigner.

Linda Kendall unsuccessfully took the authority to the High Court over its Local Plan, but lost the case.

But she used housebuilding as a platform during her unsuccessful bid to win the Rayleigh and Wickford Parliamentary seat, and continues to remain an outspoken critic of development in the area, despite losing some £45,000 in legal fees.

The authority’s Local Plan says it must build 250 homes a year – 90 more than a previous Government target.

But the council refused to tell the Echo how many it has seen build in the district over the past five years.

Ms Kendall, of the Rayleigh Action Group, said: “We are being sold a puppy. They are already building more than 250 homes a year, but their Local Plan doesn’t include the small pockets of land which have a handful of homes built on them.

“They are not listening to us and it is a total stitch up. Essex is going to become the dumping ground for London homes.

“It will just be an urban sprawl from east London to Southend.”