In the wake of Government figures that show house-building has dropped by a third in the last quarter and almost a half since this period last year, Bath MP Don Foster has once against called into question the realism of the 21,300 new homes target for Bath and North East Somerset. 

Don said that these figures show that the house building market is slowing massively, and yet the Government is asking us to significantly increase house building locally. 

The average number of homes built in the authority over the last 10 years is 400 per year.  The Government target means we’ll have to build at 1,100 units per year.  It shows that the Government really is barking mad. 

Private finance is drying up, and the affordable housing we need is not going to be built unless the Government loosens the shackles on local authorities and social landlords. 

We need to be able to focus our efforts into building affordable homes for those that need them, not having to reach some pie-in-the-sky Government target.