House builders are warning the government and local authorities that the recent cuts in planning departments has results in problems keeping up with planning applications.

Recent estimates suggest there are up to 150,000 housing plots planted in the planning system waiting for full approval. The Home Builder’s Federation Housing Pipeline report demonstrated that planning permission had returned to the pre-recession levels however it appears that individual housing schemes are finding it more difficult to get the go ahead from councils with approvals for a number of larger schemes skewing the figures.

Stewart Baseley, executive chairman of the HBF, said: “The increase in the overall number of new homes getting planning approval is very positive.

“Everyone is agreed that we need to dramatically increase house building to address our housing crisis and so getting more planning permissions is imperative.

Whilst being generally positive about the news, Baseley said: “The comparatively low number of actual sites getting permissions is concerning.

“We need to see work underway on more sites if the overall number of new homes being built is to continue to increase.

“In addition, too many sites with outline planning permission are now stuck in the planning system awaiting final permission to start on site.

“We estimate there could be as many as 150,000 plots across the country in such a position.”

It’s clear that local authorities need to do more to ensure planning departments have the resources required to get planning applications through the system quickly as the number of plots in planning could get a significant way to meeting the kind of targets, we need to hit, to get the housing problem under control.

 

Although the local authorities can play their part it's likely that stong leadership is going to be required from central government to make this happen and it's not going to be a popular policy.