Key measures are based on a year-long relaxing of planning rules, £300m of new cash for affordable housing and a £10bn package of financial guarantees.
The prime minister and deputy prime minister unveiled the plan, which they hope will deliver an extra 70,000 homes and create up to 140,000 construction jobs.
Section 106 agreements for affordable homes are to be ripped up on stalled housing schemes, which are said to be blocking development of 75,000 new homes across the country.
To help compensate for the loss to the social homes sector, the Government has found £300m in new cash to fund an extra 15,000 affordable homes.
The Government will also relax planning laws to make it easier for home owners to build larger extensions of up to 8m on detached home without planning and fast-track local authority planning.
The prime minister said: “The measures announced today show this Government is serious about rolling its sleeves up and doing it all it can to kick-start the economy.
“Some of the proposals are controversial; others have been a long time in coming.
“But along with our housing strategy, they provide a comprehensive plan to unleash one of the biggest homebuilding programmes this country has seen in a generation.
“That means more investment around the county; more jobs for our people and more young families able to realise their dreams and get on the housing ladder.”
Housing stimulus package
- Removing restrictions on house builders to help unlock 75,000 homes currently stalled due to sites being commercially unviable. Developers who can prove that council’s costly affordable housing requirements make the project unviable will see them removed.
- New legislation for Government guarantees of up to £40bn worth of major infrastructure projects and up to £10bn of new homes. The Infrastructure (Financial Assistance) Bill will include guaranteeing the debt of Housing Associations and private sector developers.
- Build up to 15,000 affordable homes and bring 5,000 empty homes back into use using new capital funding of £300m and the infrastructure guarantee.
- An additional 5,000 homes built for rent at market rates in line with proposals outlined in Sir Adrian Montague’s report to Government on boosting the private rented sector.
- Thousands of big commercial and residential applications to be directed to a major infrastructure fast track. Developers can ask the Planning Inspectorate to make a decision if the council is performing poorly.
- Calling time on poor performing town hall planning departments, putting the worst into ‘special measures’ if they have failed to improve the speed and quality of their work and allowing developers to bypass councils. More applications also will go into a fast track appeal process.
- 16,500 first-time buyers helped with a £280m extension of the successful ‘FirstBuy’ scheme, which offers aspiring homeowners a much-needed deposit and a crucial first step on the housing ladder.
- For a time limited period, slashing planning red tape, including sweeping away the rules and bureaucracy that prevent families and businesses from making improvements to their properties, helping tens of thousands of home owners and companies.
Mike Leonard, Director of the Modern Masonry Alliance, said: "We appreciate the spirit of today's announcement which will help to ease the biggest housing crisis in living memory.
"We will continue to campaign for an additional 25000 public rented homes and a cut in VAT on the labour for home Improvements.
"It is confidence and funding that is holding back the extension market not planning!"
