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

To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what recent assessment he has made of the impact of changes in the National Planning Policy Framework on the supply of new homes in Portsmouth South constituency.

This Government is committed to accelerating housing delivery to make home buying a reality for a new generation. We want decisions about homes to be driven locally and we want to get more local plans in place to deliver the homes we need. That is why we remain committed to a 300k target and to retaining a clear starting point for calculating local housing needs, and we know the best way to get more homes is having more up-to-date local plans in place.

Analysis set out in the recently published impact assessment for the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill suggests that local authorities with up-to-date local plans have higher levels of housing supply compared to authorities with out-of-date local plans, or no plan at all. Our proposals in the National Planning Policy Framework consultation seek to encourage plan making, and for local planning authorities such as Portsmouth getting up-to-date plans in place is the best way to improve housing delivery and provide the homes to meet the needs of their communities.

The proposals in the consultation are not yet government policy. We will carefully analyse the responses to the consultation, and any subsequent changes in policy will be confirmed when the Framework is updated later in 2023.