Politics & Council · Bristol
Questions raised over Bristol housing policy shift after developer meetings
By Swindon Now Editorial Team · Published
Internal council documents reveal that Bristol City Council adjusted its affordable housing requirements shortly after meeting with major developers, sparking debate over housing strategy.
New documents released following a freedom of information request have revealed that Bristol City Council modified its planning policy regarding affordable homes just eight weeks after a high-level meeting with one of the city's largest developers. The correspondence shows that Legal and General (L&G) had explicitly requested that requirements for affordable housing at the significant Temple Island development be revisited.
The meeting, which took place on 24 November last year, involved council leader Tony Dyer and the chairman of L&G, Sir John Kingman. At the time, the Temple Island project—a development comprising over 500 flats alongside a hotel, offices, and retail space—was reported to be stalling due to concerns over project viability and construction costs.
Internal briefing notes authored by council planning officers ahead of that meeting suggested that the project could not deliver affordable housing without external grant funding. The notes indicated that a zero per cent affordable housing requirement in the planning permission could potentially unlock such grants. By 19 January, the council released a new practice note, the 'Viability Addendum', which effectively allowed developers of stalled sites to move away from established policies that previously mandated between 20 and 40 per cent affordable housing.
The policy change has prompted criticism from political opponents. Labour councillor Tom Renhard described the move as a 'developers' charter,' arguing that it leaves the local authority overly reliant on the private sector's internal financial assessments. Critics contend that such measures risk undermining the provision of social housing within the city.
Councillor Dyer has defended the administration's approach, noting that with 2,000 families currently in temporary accommodation and a waiting list of 20,000, the priority must be to ensure homes are actually built. Speaking in February, he suggested that the traditional model of relying on developers to fund affordable homes via Section 106 agreements is no longer effective in the current economic climate. Instead, he advocated for a partnership approach to secure government funding for registered housing providers to acquire properties for social rent.
Following the policy change, councillors voted unanimously in April to approve the L&G plan for Temple Island. Legal and General has since pledged that a fifth of the homes on the site will be classified as affordable, with a portion of the funding sourced from government grants.
Source: Bristol Post · View original