Housing White Paper

William Wragg Excerpts

Tuesday 7th February 2017 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

We have increased local councils’ borrowing ability, but where the most ambitious councils that have good, sensible plans want to come forward to do a deal with central Government, we are listening. That invitation is in the White Paper.

[William Wragg (Hazel Grove) (Con)]

Can a self-imposed housing target become the exceptional circumstance to build on the green belt?

[Sajid Javid]

My hon. Friend helps me to highlight, again, the way in which we have tackled the green belt in this White Paper by keeping all its existing protections and demonstrating, for the first time, exactly all the hoops a local authority has to go through to show us categorically that it has looked at all other reasonable options.