North Essex Councils have shared a joint response to the government on their proposed reforms to the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) and other changes to the national planning system, raising particular concern about the need to support any new housing targets with appropriate infrastructure and 5-year housing land supply.

Braintree District Council, Chelmsford City Council, Colchester City Council, Epping Forest District Council, Essex County Council, Harlow District Council, Maldon District Council, Tendring District Council and Uttlesford District Council have worked in partnership through North Essex Councils (NEC) to share a joint statement, alongside their own individual authority responses, as part of its commitment to working together and share its views and ambitions on economic growth, infrastructure provision and housebuilding.

The response supports the Government's ambition for housing growth but believes that increased targets by themselves will not build more homes. The only way to build the extra homes is with significant, extra Government funding for infrastructure and affordable housing delivery and capacity support for councils. Just setting a target does not reflect practical considerations, such as land availability, infrastructure provision, environmental constraints or whether the developers will actually build at the rate required.

In its response, NEC recommends the government to address the gaps to deliver affordable and social housing and incentivise developers to deliver the homes where permission is granted to ensure "it is not councils and communities that are punished for the development industry's inability to deliver.

The response also states significant concerns over proposals to re-introduce the 5-year housing land supply requirement. It argues sensible transitional arrangements need to be put in place to allow councils to "move smoothly from existing to new targets without fear of speculative development, planning by appeal and the huge damage it does to the effective use of limited public resources" as well as immunity from the need to demonstrate a 5-year supply for authorities, like in North Essex, that are "working together to plan for housing, employment and infrastructure in a sensible, strategic and sustainable way to help achieve the Government's ambitions for growth".

It also pushes for long-term, substantial investment and funding arrangements to support infrastructure provision, like transport, healthcare and education, to deliver and support the scale of housebuilding the government is proposing.

The councils do welcome the government's new homes accelerator programme to speed up the delivery of stalled housing sites and suggests "widening to identify and fund shortfalls in capacity, capital infrastructure or viability gap funding" to help increase further delivery both within Essex and nationally.

Councillor Chris Whitbread, Chair of North Essex Councils Leaders and Chief Executive group, said: "Whilst we understand the government's ambition for growth, collectively there are practical issues in the planning system that need to be addressed which we've shared with the government as a partnership, to help us deliver local ambitions and shared solutions across North Essex.

"While the current planning system pressure varies from council to council, we are all feeling the impact - the need to provide people with safe and affordable homes is more important than ever, dealing with poor quality, speculative planning applications and appeals, and a lack of funding and investment to support infrastructure delivery many of our communities need.

"We have made various recommendations with a plea for the government to work with us to make the growth this country desperately needs happen, but in the right way that is sensible, sustainable and strategic and works best for our local areas and communities."

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