Nick Clegg unveils plans for three new garden cities to target 'chronic' housing shortage

 
Nick Clegg: the deputy prime minister has announced plans for three new garden cities
Alexandra Rucki14 April 2014
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Three garden cities containing more than 15,000 homes are set to be constructed in a bid to deal with the housing shortage, Nick Clegg has unveiled.

The deputy prime minister, speaking at a media conference, said the three cities will be located between Oxford and Cambridge on sites yet to be identified.

Funding from an existing £2.4bn pit will be made available and the government has published a prospectus inviting bids from local authorities.

It comes after 109,370 new homes were completed in England last year, the lowest figure for four years.

The plans echo post-war town planners who created 27 new towns across the UK in the 1940s, such as Corby, Harlow, Milton Keynes and Peterlee.

Mr Clegg said: “The average first-time buyer is now over 30. Home ownership is falling for the first time in a generation.

"Once, owning a home was a dream that most people would achieve one day. Now that dream is becoming increasingly like a pipe dream for many young people.

"We have got to do more to tackle Britain's chronic lack of housing, and to build high-quality homes in thriving new communities."

The prospectus invites councils to put forward their own ideas for how they wish to develop garden cities, how they would use the funding and what else they can offer to make ‘ambitious new garden cities a reality.’

Last month Chancellor George Osborne announced funding for a garden city in Ebbsfleet, Kent.

Read More

In London brownfield site Battersea Power Station is being turned into a new high street and city, while thousands of new houses are being created in Vauxhall and Nine Elms.

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