5 Year Housing Land Supply - Public forum - Planning Advisory Service (PAS)

Graeme please feel free to have a look at our five year housing supply document which we produce each year. http://www.tandridge.gov.uk/yourcouncil/documents/document_display.htm?pk_document=2612 The five year supply has to be demonstrated year on year in order to meet PPS3 requirements, the five year supply informs the SHLAA which has to cover 15 years. It cannot be 'pie in th sky' a developers take a keen interest in it and will be critical if not based on reality. Hopefully the document will answer many of your questions.

Hi Graeme You are right to think the 5 year supply, strategic housing land availability assessment (SHLAA) and core strategy are all linked, but they are seperate things. The Core Strategy is the development plan for an area that sets out how an area will grow and develop over the next 15 years. The SHLAA is a piece of evidence (a study) that assesses all the land in a district and identifies which sites may be suitable for housing development. The SHLAA totals up the land supply and expresses it in terms of how many years worth of housing the district has. The calculation of a 5, 10 or 15 year land supply is based on a district's annual housing target. This target is currently set by regional spatial strategies, but these are to be abolished shortly. The target will then be set locally. So, an example. If a district's housing target is 1000 homes per year, and their SHLAA identifies sites which in total have the potential to accommodate 6000 homes, the district would say it has a 6 year land supply. However, the 5 year land supply issue is a bit more complicated than that. Because as well as identifying new development sites, the SHLAA also adds up all the housing to be delivered via existing planning permissions. There are other sources of supply as well, like sites that were allocated for development in a previous plan but not yet developed. So, if a district has new sites with potential for 6000 homes, but also old sites from an old plan with potentiall for 1000 homes, and also outstanding planning permissions with potential for a further 2000 homes, that would make a total supply of 9000, or 9 years. The SHLAA is an important document for the Core Strategy, because it demonstrates whether there is sufficient land in the district to meet the area's housing requirements. Currently, it is a requirement that the Core Strategy covers 15 years, and therefore 15 years supply should be shown in the Core Strategy. It is actually good practice to try and find 16 or 17 years supply in the SHLAA, to ensure the Core Strategy is flexible. The 5 year supply, or more accurately, the local authority's ability to demonstrate it has 5 years worth of sites for housing, is a requirement of planning policy statement 3. If a district does not have 5 years worth of land for housing, they will find it difficult to refuse planning permission for more land. A developer may argue that their site should get planning permission, so that the district has sufficient land. However, if a district has more than sufficient land supply, say 7 or 8 years worth, they could argue that they don't need any more land for housing, and refuse planning permission. Sorry for the long reply, I hope it helps. You may find this useful: http://www.communities.gov.uk/documents/planningandbuilding/pdf/399267.pdf http://www.lgyh.gov.uk/dnlds/SHLAA%20Regional%20Practice%20Guide.pdf

The housing trajectory is also part of the 'family'. The housing trajectory with its colourful chart should help to illustrate the expected rate of housing delivery for the plan period. The data comes from the SHLAA and helps to feed into the five year housing land supply. In the past it was required to take a 'forward look' (from the current year) when preparing a five year housing land supply report e.g. current year is 2011/12 so the five year period should be 1 April 2012 to 31 March 2017. I assume this is still the case...