Cornwall MPs and Councils call for 'step-up' in affordable home efforts
They've been meeting with the Housing Minister on the issue
Cornwall's MPs, the county's council and officials from the Isles of Scilly, are calling for efforts to 'step-up' the delivery of affordable homes in the area.
They've been meeting with Housing Minister, Matthew Pennycook MP today (Tuesday 1st April) to put together a programme aimed at increasing lower-cost properties by the end of this Parliament.
West Cornwall Liberal Democrat MP, Andrew George, arranged the meeting, saying he wanted to 'put right a system his government inherited' from the previous administration.
He said: “Over £500 million of taxpayers’ money has been handed to holiday-home owners in Cornwall in the last decade, while the housing crisis for local families has reached its worst state in living memory.”
The meeting took place on the same day new regulations came into force, allowing Cornwall and Scilly Councils to levy double council tax on second homes.
MPs are now calling for further planning powers to limit the rise in second and holiday home ownership, to close tax loopholes which allow holiday lets to avoid paying council tax or business rates at all, and to roll out a holiday let registration scheme, using Cornwall and Scilly as a pilot scheme.
Andrew George MP said: “We are all pushing in the same direction. Cornwall and Scilly are in the middle of the worst housing crisis in living memory. The need to address housing and investment injustices inherited from the previous government is urgent.
"That’s why I was encouraged the Minister agreed to work with us to ensure that Cornwall and Scilly can control second and holiday homes and to make sure they pay a fair contribution to the public purse, and so we have the funds to deliver an accelerated programme of social rent and affordable homes for locals.
“Today, the government finally implemented the policy of doubling council tax on second homes. Though this has been a hard-won policy change that I’ve campaigned on for years, our delegation is keen to deliver the homes desperately needed. This isn’t the politics of envy. It’s simply the politics of social justice.
“Turning around this crisis is a mammoth task, but it’s vitally important we do all we can to help the tens of thousands of local families whose lives are blighted by the serious unfairness of the system.”