AN MP urged the prime minister to keep his word and abolish housing targets that are “damaging” Barnet.
Chipping Barnet MP Theresa Villiers has been campaigning against "overdevelopment" within her constituency – which she says is driven by “excessive housing targets”.
Barnet’s draft local plan earmarks sites for 46,000 homes over the next 15 years.
The MP has warned that the target could “urbanise the suburbs” and claimed it could seriously damage the local environment and the quality of life for Barnet people.
Addressing Rishi Sunak during the Prime Minister’s Question Time, she asked: “Excessive housing targets are placing greater and greater pressure on councils to approve development that damages our environment.
“When the prime minister came to Finchley over the summer, he said that he wanted to abolish those targets.
“Will he use the report stage of the levelling up and regeneration bill to bring forward Government amendments to do that?”
The MP has previously argued that inspectors might ask for the number of homes required in the period up to 2036 to be even higher.
She said that low-rise outer suburban character of Chipping Barnet will be under threat if the targets in the plan are set or increased.
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Mr Sunak replied: “The Government are committed to making home ownership a reality for a new generation, and we must build homes in the right places - where people want to live and work - but as my right honourable friend knows and I have said I want those decisions to be taken locally with greater say for local communities rather than distant bureaucrats.
“The Secretary of State is happy to meet her to discuss how best to make that a reality.”
Speaking after her talk with Mr Sunak, she said: “I hope to meet with the Secretary of State Michael Gove to urge him to get rid of these targets that bear no relation to what an area can cope with and which are undermining local control over planning decisions.”
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