No change to standard method of calculating housing need, but 35% uplift for big cities is introduced.

The government is to retain its existing standard method for calculating housing need, including its reliance on the 2014-based household projections, but has announced that it will add a new “cities and urban centres uplift” of 35 per cent for England’s 20 biggest cities and towns.

Following a backlash from Conservative MPs to the proposal to revise the proposed new standard housing need method, the government confirmed in December that it has decided “the most appropriate approach is to retain the standard method in its current form”.

However, the document adds, “in order to meet our principles of delivering more homes on brownfield land we will apply a 35 per cent uplift to the post-cap number generated by the standard method to Greater London and to the local authorities which contain the largest proportion of the other 19 most populated cities and urban centres in England’. For more information on this issue, including a list of those areas subject to the uplift, please contact Guy Wakefield in the Planning Team.

A copy of the publication can be found here