Providing the right level and type of housing is one of the most important challenges for local authorities in the West Midlands.

CPRE believes we need to put much more emphasis into building the affordable houses we need in rural areas rather than simply allocating large targets across the region.
If we build at the right levels of housing we can provide homes for the people who need them, concentrating mainly in our major urban areas, but if we try to build too many we will come up against huge environmental barriers. Building on green field land will only fuel the number of people leaving our towns for the countryside and make urban depredation and rural unaffordability worse.

Ministers in the previous Government were unwilling to contemplate anything but the highest levels of house building based on unreliable predictions of the future need for housing. The new Government has signalled that it wants housing determined locally to meet genuine housing need but has left this up to local authorities rather than Regional decision makers. CPRE will be looking to Local Authorities to build at a more sensible rate, taking account of the impact on the countryside and the need to concentrate on housing that is affordable.

But it’s not just about numbers. We need to treat land as a scarce and valuable resource and build at the right density, which will vary from town to country.
We will also need to pay more attention to the design of housing, ensuring it fits its surroundings, both natural and man made. Good design should include building homes which are environmentally friendly and ensuring existing homes perform to high environmental standards. And, of course, we have to recognise that homes are part of our heritage and be cautious about when and where to demolish them.

24.08.10