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WRITTEN QUESTION TO THE MINISTER FOR HOUSING BY DEPUTY G.P. SOUTHERN OF ST. HELIER
ANSWER TO BE TABLED ON TUESDAY 26th APRIL 2016
Question
In response to the Jersey's Future Housing Needs 2016 to 2018 Report', what targets for the creation of additional housing supply does the Minister have for 2-year, 5-year and 10-year timescales in social rental, First Time Buyer and Category B housing? Given the current and predicted housing price/earnings ratios, is it her priority to increase the affordable rental sector supply to house the population adequately, and if not, why not?
Answer
The Housing Needs Survey shows that there is still a shortfall of housing overall, although the situation has considerably improved since 2012. In order to directly address this, the recently published Housing Strategy focusses on the need for more affordable and better quality homes.
Specifically, the Housing Strategy prioritises measures to:
Increase affordable housing supply to relieve any upward pressures on the costs of both renting and purchasing a home – with the objective of providing 1,000 new affordable units of accommodation up to 2020.
The primary policy route to delivering more homes will come from the land use policies outlined in the current Island Plan and these will deliver the following estimated supply of homes:
Year | Affordable Rent | Affordable Purchase | Total Affordable | Category B |
2016 | 77 | 20 | 97 | 300 |
2017 | -94[1] | 20 | -74 | 300 |
2 year Sub total | -17 | 40 | 23 | 600 |
2018 | 91 | 95 | 166 | 300 |
2019 | 406 | 60 | 446 | 300 |
2020 | 362 | 35 | 362 | 300 |
5 year Grand Total | 907 | 230 | 1137 | 1500 |
The additional 1137 affordable homes for rent and purchase will have a significant impact on addressing the needs of those households seeking more affordable rental accommodation as identified in the Housing Needs Survey.
The total estimated supply for the period 2016-20 is still in line to meet with the total estimated demand over this period. Furthermore, the current Housing Needs Survey demonstrates that overall levels of demand have dropped from those previously reported in the 2012 survey, which provides further comfort for the adequacy of estimated future supply to meet the needs of the Island.
Estimating the supply of homes to meet specific housing groups for the next 10 year period is more difficult as this will need to be derived from future housing needs surveys.
In order to address these general longer term housing needs, I am working closely with the Affordable Housing Providers to encourage new sites to be identified and developed and with Jersey Property Holdings to identify additional sites for housing that may emerge from the review of the States property portfolio as they become redundant.
The Strategic Housing Unit will be working with the Environment Department and Statistics Unit on the next review of the Island Plan to identify the demand and supply of housing for the period beyond 2020.