Councils Face Pressure To Publish And Adopt Updated Housing Plans

Local councils must produce plans to speed up the provision of housing by 2017 or risk losing control of their planning process, David Cameron will say as the government prepares to publish its much awaited housing bill. The legislation will contain measures requiring councils to sell off their most expensive properties and to allow housing association tenants to buy their property. So far 82% of English councils have published local plans, which should set out how many homes they plan to deliver over a set period, but only 65% have fully adopted them and almost 20% of councils do not have an up-to-date plan at all. The bill also contains measures previously set out in the government productivity plan for automatic planning permission in principle on brownfield sites. Read more on the Guardian website.