Cabinet minister Michael Gove appeared to drop the Conservative party’s promise to build 300,000 new homes a year – saying he was no longer “bound” by a particular target.
The levelling up secretary said “arbitrary” targets for the number of homes were less important than the quality of new housing and winning community support.
The Tory party’s 2019 manifesto pledge included a commitment to build 300,000 new homes a year by the middle of the decade to help meet the drastic shortage.
Admitting the government would fail to hit the target this year, Mr Gove told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that residents were unhappy about houses being “plonked down simply in order to meet an arbitrary target”.
Asked if the Tories were committed to meeting the pledge, he said it was “no kind of success simply to hit a target if the homes that are built are shoddy, in the wrong place, don’t have the infrastructure required, and are not contributing to beautiful communities”.
Mr Gove added: “Ultimately when you are building a new dwelling, you are not simply trying to hit a statistical target. I’m certainly not.”
Reminded that the Tory party had promised a statistical target, he said: “Well, it’s only one of a number of things that we need to do. We are not bound – I am not bound – by one criterion alone when it comes to development.”
He also said did not want to be “tied to a Procrustean bed” – a reference to the Greek myth of Procrustes who tortured people to make them fit into a one-size-fits-all bed.
Boris Johnson’s official spokesperson later denied that the 300,000-home target had been ditched, telling reporters: “Our target to deliver 300,000 homes a year by the mid 2020s is central to our levelling up mission.
“And, as you heard the levelling up secretary say, those homes need to be good quality, they need to be well designed and come with the infrastructure that new development needs.”
The spokesperson said that the government was “on track”, before hastily correcting himself to say it was “certainly making progress towards that target”.
It comes as Mr Gove defended the government’s plan to give neighbours the right to veto housing in their area, claiming it will help build support for new development.
Mr Gove said “local democratic ballots, sometimes street by street” as part of the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill would allow residents to become “partners” in building projects.
Labour MP Clive Betts, chair of the housing committee, said the “street votes” plan was a gimmick, arguing that it was not possible for residents to “decide absolutely everything” about building in their area.
The Times reported that local residents will be permitted to hold referendums over both the style and size of extensions, conversions and new homes on their street, as well as deciding whether more conservatories can be built without full planning permission.
The government has ditched a previous proposals which would have made it harder to block housing development after a backlash from Tory MPs worried about voters in leafy shire constituencies.
There was a plan to bring in a zonal system where councils would be expected to identify “growth areas” for housing where planning restrictions would have been relaxed.
Former Tory housing secretary Robert Jenrick, who had proposed the zonal system, warned that the government will now miss its 300,000 homes-a-year manifesto pledge “by a country mile”.
He told the Commons: “It is a matter of the greatest importance to this country that we build more homes. Successive governments have failed to do this. There’s always an excuse.”
