Housing Minister outlines plans for new generation of towns
Housing minister Matthew Pennycook said the government has appointed a taskforce to identify sites in which new towns could be built. It follows the government's annnouncement of housing targets being set to 370,000 per year. Mr Pennycook added that building work on some of the new homes in the new towns could start before the next election.
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00:00Well we've asked the taskforce to report within 12 months but if it can do so earlier on specific
00:04sites and notify us that there are appropriate locations that they think we should move on
00:09we're absolutely willing to do that if they come forward. I'm not too worried actually
00:12about the sort of resistance from communities. What we've had in our early stages of these
00:16conversations and what we're going to ask the taskforce to double down on is those conversations
00:20with local leaders, local communities, in places where they want development to come
00:24forward and they see large-scale new settlements of this kind as a way to meet their housing
00:29need of a particular area rather than, if you like, a few hundred homes on the edge
00:33of every village and urban settlement in the area. Sometimes a large-scale new community
00:37is the solution over and above what local authorities need to do. So there have been
00:42expressions of interest, I'm sure we'll see more. Ultimately it is for ministers and government
00:46to determine where the appropriate locations are and we have a duty to do so in the national
00:51interest because we have a housing crisis, an acute housing crisis.