The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) has removed housing funding totaling £538.8m from 16 projects
These projects, intended to unlock over 42,000 new homes, were withdrawn by the DLUHC as they were deemed “not deliverable within the parameters of the program or were withdrawn by the local authority.”
The removed funding was part of the allocated grants from the Housing Infrastructure Fund (HIF), which is worth over £4bn and was launched in 2017 to boost housebuilding.
Funding through the HIF is divided into two streams
The fund works by offering local authorities grant funding for key infrastructure on a competitive basis. Just under 100 councils were awarded funding through this scheme.
The first stream of funding is ‘forward funding’, which is available to all single and lower-tier local authorities in England to “provide the final or missing piece of infrastructure funding”.
The second stream of funding is ‘marginal viability funding,’ which is available to the uppermost tier of local authorities for a “small number of strategic and high-impact infrastructure projects.”
What housing funding was withdrawn?
The five forward funding projects that had funding withdrawn were from the following authorities:
Cornwall
Wiltshire
Medway
Lancashire
Thurrock
These projects together had an allocated total of £473.1m.
The 11 marginal viability projects that had funding withdrawn were from the following areas:
Thanet
Cheltenham
Tyne and Wear
North Kesteven
Breckland
Eastbourne
Cornwall
Barnet
Mid Devon
Buckinghamshire
West Sussex
The total allocated funding withdrawn from these projects was £65.7m.
The letter from Sarah Healey, permanent secretary of the Department of Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, to Clive Betts, chair of the leveling up committee (published Tuesday 20 February) stated:
“[W]here it becomes clear that a project cannot be delivered within the Fund, it is withdrawn, and the proposed infrastructure will not be delivered at this time. However, we are continuing to work through Homes England to explore other housing and infrastructure options in these areas.”
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