Shelter Cymru have called this morning for the Welsh Government’s housing targets to be revised upwards.
They say that the latest estimates suggest that demand is outstripping supply in Wales by a much greater degree than previously thought and more investment is urgently needed.
The Assembly Government has pledged to deliver an extra 6,500 affordable homes by April 2011 and a spokesman said it is not shying away from that target, despite the recession.
But in a paper for Shelter Cymru, Alan Holmans, research fellow at the Cambridge Centre for Housing and Planning Research, revised his original estimates of the number of new homes needed in Wales.
In 2003 he estimated that at least 8,600 new homes were needed each year. Of these, he said 2,500 needed to be affordable. He now believes at least 13,000 homes a year are required, an increase of a third.
Mr Puzey said he believed that translated to a rise in affordable home provision from 2,500 to 4,000 a year.
“Around 91,000 households are waiting for council or social housing in Wales, yet there are more than 26,000 privately-owned properties lying empty,” he said.
“Bringing even some of these back into use would have huge benefits financially, socially and environmentally.”
The call for an empty home strategy very much reflects the motion tabled by the Welsh Liberal Democrats for debate on Wednesday. However, the claim later on in the article by an anonymous Government spokesperson that WAG have already created 3,252 affordable homes, more than 50% of the target is simply not true. It seems that spin is being used by the Plaid Cymru Minister to deflect proper scrutiny.
The One Wales agreement is clear that the government would not just build 6,500 homes, but would increase the supply of affordable homes by this amount. Only counting what has been built but ignoring what has been lost isn’t a measure of her success in reaching her targets.
A total of 976 local authority owned properties and 104 social landlord owned properties have been sold between 2007/08 and 2008/09. In 2007/08 67 social housing units were demolished.
This means that 1,147 affordable housing units have to be deducted from the Ministers 3,252 figure, so that the supply of affordable housing has only increased by 2,105 units.
It does nobody any good for Ministers to rewrite the targets in One Wales just because they are failing to achieve them.
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