Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:

To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, how many local authorities in (a) the North West region and (b) England have (i) adopted an Objectively Assessed Need (OAN) plan, (ii) chosen to build fewer homes than their OAN and (iii) chosen to build the full OAN.

The National Planning Policy Framework requires local planning authorities to plan to meet the objectively assessed housing needs of their area.

Where an authority is unable to meet its need locally, it is expected to work with neighbouring authorities through the duty to co-operate to determine whether the unmet need can be met across the wider area.

Bolton’s current Local Plan, adopted in March 2011, sets an average annual housing target of 694 dwellings per annum. Wigan’s existing Local Plan, adopted in September 2013, has an average annual housing target of 1,000 dwellings per annum.

The Department publishes information on the number of net new dwellings developed in each local authority every year. This may be found at:

https://www.gov.uk/government/statistical-data-sets/live-tables-on-net-supply-of-housing (table 122). This table shows that the number of net additions for Bolton and Wigan for 2015/16 were 510 and 640 respectively.

A table setting out existing Local Plan targets, where known, and their delivery in 2015/16 for authorities in North West England is set out below.

The Government expects local authorities to review their plans regularly to ensure that they are kept up-to-date. The Mayor of Manchester is currently preparing a Greater Manchester Spatial Framework, which includes Bolton and Wigan.