Labour has said it’s time for the local council to stop bending to the will of developers when it comes to affordable housing and other developer contributions.

Planning law requires affordable housing, education funding and open space and sports provision to be factored into new developments.  The council has a policy of 20% affordable housing on brownfield site developments, and 30% on greenfield sites.

But Labour Group Leader, Cllr Claire Douglas, says developers’ ability to get away with far less and sometimes none at all, has got out of control in York.

She said:

“The council has these policies and yet often they are not worth the paper they are written on.  A developer can significantly overpay to buy a development site, such as Heworth Gasworks, and then come back to the council and say it can’t provide appropriate developer contributions or it won’t get enough profit.  It begs the question – why should York residents lose the affordable housing for what is essentially a very bad private business decision? Yet this has the become the norm in York and the local planning authority in the council is putting up almost no fight whatsoever”.

Cllr Douglas addressed last week’s Planning Committee meeting to express her frustrations and her view that the council and Planning Authority folding in the face of developers threatening to pull out of developments has got to stop.

York risks losing hundreds of affordable homes on sites like Heworth Gasworks, neighbouring development Icona II on Eboracum Way, the former British Sugar site at Boroughbridge Road, where the affordable housing is expected to be as little as 3%, and has already lost out on sites such as the Roman Quarter where there is expected to be no affordable housing at all.

Cllr Douglas also drew attention to the way some developers are flouting planning conditions, including examples of building higher than permitted, and using more invasive drilling methods than permitted.

“We need a properly resourced planning enforcement department, as well as planning department that is prepared to stand up for York residents.  Developers both large and small currently see the council as a pushover, and it is our communities that are suffering as a result”, added Cllr Douglas.