Calls for more homes to help housing waiting list

At a meeting of the county council's economy, residents and communities scrutiny committee, councillors looked at the former administration’s Vision 2025 corporate plan and how the current administration's new plan will replace it next year.

Councillor Jeremy Brignell-Thorp said: “We’ve got a target of constructing 250 new homes by the end of 2025, which seems a rather modest number as we know the number of people on the waiting list is about 5,000.

“Is the 250-target appropriate and will it solve the waiting list problem?”

Deputy council leader and portfolio holder for housing, Matthew Dorrance told the committee that 61 new council houses had been completed, seven had been bought from developers, with another 56 in the pipeline now that planning permission had been secured

He said: “We will be modifying the future corporate plan and the focus will not just be on building new homes but on acquisition and bringing empties back into use.

“So, we have a take a three-pronged attack to what is a housing crisis in Powys.”

Committee chairman Councillor Angela Davies said that people were having problems contacting the council’s planning department and experienced delays with applications.

Councillor Dorrance said: “It’s no secret that the planning service has experienced the harsh brutality of austerity. If we want to speed up planning, that takes resources.”

Head of planning Gwilym Davies said that the staff turnover in the department had been 70 per cent in recent years.

Work was now taking place to “grow our own” planning officers, by training staff up to degree level.

Mr Davies said: “We’re seeing good progress, but the loss of staff has had a big impact on us.”

He added that talks with planning agents to get better quality planning applications submitted to the council would also quicken the process.

The report will go on to be discussed by the cabinet.