Interim Housing Policy - July 2010

The Council adopted a new interim housing policy on 21 July 2010. The policy allows for market housing in most of the borough’s settlements. It aims to maintain a healthy supply of housing land and to secure more affordable housing in the villages. It is less restrictive than Local Plan Policy DE1 (Adobe PDF format, 35kb).

Download the Interim Housing Policy (Adobe PDF format, 150kb)
View maps of the settlements referred to in the Interim Housing Policy

The new policy does not have the same status as a Local Plan policy (as it was not prepared in accordance with government plan-making regulations). However, it will be an important material consideration when assessing planning applications for housing. Other Local Plan policies remain in force, for example the policies protecting open space, employment land, and the Green Belt.

The settlements where we will allow housing were chosen based on how many services and facilities they offer, in line with our Sustainable Settlement Study.

Download the West Lancashire Sustainable Settlement Study (Adobe PDF format, 1.1mb)

We envisage that the interim housing policy will apply until we adopt our Local Plan, probably in 2013. If there are significant changes to local circumstances before then, we will review the new policy.

Latest housing land supply position

The most recent statement of housing land supply in West Lancashire is contained in the 2011 Housing Land Supply report (Adobe PDF format, 864kb). This report concludes that we have marginally below a five year supply of deliverable housing sites.

Background to West Lancashire housing policy

The Council adopted a very restrictive housing policy in November 2002. This was due to the fact that a significant proportion of the 2001-2015 plan's housing targets had been met relatively early in the plan period. Also, regional policy required that development be constrained in certain areas in order to kick start regeneration elsewhere.

Since 2007, national and regional policy places more emphasis on providing housing. West Lancashire's housing requirement was increased in 2008 from 185 to 300 dwellings per year.

In January 2009, we published a housing policy guidance note (now superseded), setting out how Policy DE1 would work in the light of the new regional and national policies. This did not change policy. Since then, a decline in housing land supply has led to a need to relax Policy DE1, resulting in the Interim Housing Policy. We prepared a draft policy in December 2009, and consulted on it during February and March 2010. We received approximately 100 responses, and made a few changes to the draft policy as a result, before adopting it.