Isle of Wight MP Bob Seely this week demanded that Government do more to support house-building for the Island – and won an agreement from the Housing Minister that he would work with the Isle of Wight Council.
Bob is campaigning to improve the Island Plan so that houses are built in suitable numbers, for Islanders. He is campaigning against greenfield developments.
Mr Seely said:
“In relation to local plans and housing the IW Council wants to set up a company to build council housing and I strongly support this. It says that it can’t access the necessary funds because it does not have a housing revenue account.”
Bob asked the Minister what he can do to help the Isle of Wight Council build housing for Islanders.
In his response Mr Malthouse congratulated Mr Seely for working closely with the council with its aspiration to build more council homes and said:
“This is exactly the sort of action we want to see from local authorities.
“I am aware that quite a lot of councils in that situation don’t have a housing revenue account despite us lifting the cap and enabling them to access the funding that they need and I’d be more than happy to arrange for his councillors, or council officials, to meet with my officials to determine how they could establish just such an account.”
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Speaking on Tuesday, Bob said:
“The Island Plan in its current form is not fit for purpose. I want to see housing for Islanders, built in appropriate numbers, in existing communities.
“Too much housing on the Island is not built for Islanders, the scale of building is damaging communities. Over-development will damage our quality of life and our tourism economy.
“I want to support the Council in prioritising house-building for Islanders, but it needs to be done well.
“I hope that our Council officers meeting with the Government will help to unlock funding.”
Building new homes for Islanders, that’s a joke…….
Just what we need, more houses and more rent paid for by the Council…
O K providing the speculative developments for housing mainland inner city spillovers are stopped.
Perhaps the council shouldn’t have sold out to private enterprise in the first place.
Yes build more council houses – but only for Islanders – not overspill from elsewhere.
As long as its for island folk! Keep those bloody londoners and their knives and drugs in London and stop giving them our much needed social housing for locals! 10 years I have been waiting to be housed by this crappy council!
Island independence I say kick em out
What about health care and schooling? Takes 6-8 weeks to get a doctor’s appointment how’s building more houses going to help the situation in the state it’s currently in?
one has to wonder how the country operates with so few members attending meetings , or have i just answered my own question !!