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back because the costs of putting in the infrastructure
and building the homes are too great. For these types of development, the Government will provide the final, or missing, piece of infrastructure funding to get additional sites allocated or existing sites unblocked. Government expect the infrastructure to be built soon after schemes have been awarded funding and for the homes to follow at pace.
Several HIF Marginal Viability Fund bids were made by Kent Districts. Dover, Swale and Thanet were successful and are in contract negotiation:
Kent and Medway Housing Strategy
Housing remains high on the agenda for the government, with continued commitment to accelerating housing growth and meeting the target of 300,000 new homes each year
by the middle of 2020. To support this ambitious national delivery target government has published a range of policy announcements and provided funding opportunities that include:
• Community Housing Fund of £163m
• £125 m Care and Support Specialist Housing Fund to
develop new affordable homes to meet the needs of older
people and disabled adults by 2020/21
• Move on Fund of £44m for capital expenditure to provide
up to 879 beds for rough sleepers or those living in a refuge
or hostel by 2021
• An updated Shared Ownership and Affordable Homes
Programme with continuous market engagement opportunities for a mix of tenures for schemes to achieve planning consent by March 2021
•The abolition of the Housing Revenue Account (HRA) Debt Cap and new HRA Borrowing prospectus.
The refresh of the Kent and Medway strategy is being developed and aligned to respond to the current challenges and opportunities at a strategic level, both nationally and locally. It will link to and reference documents such as the recently published Homes England Strategic Vision (20018 to 2023), the South East LEP Economic Strategy Statement (a bridging document whilst the Local Industrial Strategy
is developed) and the Kent and Medway Growth and Infrastructure Framework. As additional strategy or policies, national or local, come forward Kent Housing Group
(KHG) will reflect upon these for relevance to the emerging strategy.
The Kent & Medway Housing Strategy 2018-2023 will
also aim to provide a platform for a shared approach and ambition to meet the county’s’ housing challenge including tenure, affordability and supported housing. It will be a document that can be used by a range of partners to lobby at local and national levels, to ensure that Kent and Medway can meet identified growth ambitions and ensure that communities benefit from homes and places where they wish to live and work. The success of the strategy will be the development of an all-encompassing document that is relevant to all providers of homes in Kent and Medway.
The refreshed strategy will:
• Provide clarity on the major strategic housing challenges
facing Kent and Medway, identify common areas of concern and propose pragmatic solutions on issues where a Kent and Medway perspective could add value and contribute to delivery of local ambitions.
• Recognise that there is a great diversity of housing provision across Kent and Medway and that what is appropriate for one neighbourhood may not be right in another.
• Set out a menu of solutions to assist authorities in achieving their local aims, whilst supporting the collective objective to deliver an ambitious housing offer.
Kent Planning Protocol
The Kent Developers Group, Kent Planning Officers Group and Kent Housing Group have continued to collaborate in the implementation of the countywide Planning Protocol to share best practice and assist with the delivery of the housing, employment and growth aspirations.
The planning process can be hugely complex and lengthy. The planning protocol seeks to make the process more efficient by enabling greater collaboration in the pre- application and planning application stages of the process through better communication and consistency.
The protocol has already been used to enable discussions between the districts and developers to address the growth agenda, whilst maintaining quality and delivering through open dialogue. As part of the protocol, the private and public sector are working together to address the skills that the industry needs to maintain an effective planning system and Kent colleges have responded to the need for more planners within the County.
Initially launched in 2017, following endorsement from politicians and officers in all planning authorities it has received a great deal of support. It confirms the commitment to the growth agenda and to the delivery of the housing numbers, commercial requirements and much needed infrastructure, in quality sustainable development. It
is supported by Kent Highways, Homes England, The Environment Agency, Natural England, South East Local Enterprise Partnership and many other stakeholders and describes Kent’s approach to delivery requirements and working collaboratively to succeed.
Dover
Swale
Thanet
Dover Rapid Bus Transit
Queenborough & Rushenden Regeneration
Manston/Haine Roundabout
£16.08m
£5.18m
£5.80m
Small Sites Fund
Several applications have been received for small sites funding. Homes England will work with Local Authorities to provide grant funding to unlock these sites by 2021.
Local Authority Accelerated Construction
One site in Medway has successfully bid for funding and is in contract. Further bids in Kent are in due diligence stage.
Future High Streets Fund
An additional 50 towns will now benefit from the £1billion Future High Streets Fund. This extension to those already shortlisted is in addition to the £3.6bn Towns Fund already announced in July, which included an extra £325m for the Future High Streets Fund, taking the overall Fund to £1bn as the Government looks to drive forward local growth. The scheme was launched in December 2018 and is a key part of the Government’s plan to renew and reshape town centres and high streets in a way that drives economic growth and sustainably improves living standards.
Successful bids will enable towns to progress to the second phase of the Future High Streets Fund and receive up to £150,000 to support the development of detailed final project proposals that can then be submitted for capital funding.
In Kent and Medway successful bids from local authorities in Dartford, Dover, Thanet (Ramsgate) and Medway (Chatham) have progressed to this second round phase.
Kent Property Market Report 2019 41