Local Plan halted after housing targets trebled

The trebling of a target for new houses in North Yorkshire has prompted council chiefs to halt work on a fresh Local Plan for Selby.

North Yorkshire Council members have agreed to stop the preparation of the document, which would have provided a blueprint for development in the town until 2040.

The authority's executive heard on Tuesday that the government target for housebuilding in the county had gone from 1,300 units a year to 4,077.

Councillor Mark Crane said: "We feel this is the right time to stop."

He added: "Unfortunately the figures from the government would have such an impact on any Local Plan that we no longer feel it's worth going ahead.

"We would have to go about consultation and find significant extra sites in order to reach the number of houses that Selby would require to deliver to get to North Yorkshire's 4,077," he said.

Crane said work already completed on the plans would not be lost, according to the Local Democracy Reporting Service.

He added: "It will now be subsumed into the new North Yorkshire Local Plan and so the money spent, and the time spent so far, will not have been wasted."

A report to councillors advised that the plan could not be submitted to the Secretary of State for final approval without further time and money being spent on the document.

The emerging Local Plan worked on the assumption that 368 new houses in the Selby area would be needed every year to meet demand.

However, using calculations in the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF), which was released by the government in December, between 483 and 561 properties a year would now be needed, meaning a shortfall of up to 2,895 houses over the plan's lifespan.

For the plan to be approved, further work would have been needed to allocate new sites for housing, including more public consultation exercises.

Council officers estimated that it would cost around £180,000 to ensure the plan was legally sound.

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