Planning Bill
2:00 pm
Neil Sinden: The first thing to say about the community infrastructure levy is that we welcome Government efforts to secure a better mechanism for extracting what planners call “betterment” from development schemes. However, we are concerned about how they will work in practice, particularly the relationship between the levy and section 106 agreements, and specifically in the area of affordable housing provision. I am sure that Members are aware that, at present, a significant proportion of such provision comes through section 106 agreements on the ground. They are a useful complement to Government subsidies for affordable housing provision.
The danger with the community infrastructure levy, regardless of where it is applied, is that it could draw money and resources away from the provision of affordable housing through section 106 and thereby damage the Government’s objectives of increasing the provision of affordable housing in appropriate locations to meet identified needs.