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The President and Vice President of the Development & Planning Authority have no plans to propose a suspension or substantial changes to GP11 - a controversial planning policy on affordable housing.
Deputy Victoria Oliver, the President of the Authority, told a scrutiny hearing yesterday that GP11 "probably will be left to the review of the Island Development Plan", which is required by law in advance of the Plan reaching the end of its life in 2026, and added that the Authority "has not discussed it yet in very much detail".
Her Vice President, Deputy Andrew Taylor, told the hearing that "politically giving more support to GP11 would be a good thing - either in its current state or if there were minor amendments to tweak it".
Pictured: Deputy Victoria Oliver, President of the Development & Planning Authority, said there were currently no plans to make changes to GP11.
Policy GP11, which requires developments of 20 housing units or more to include a percentage of social or affordable housing, has been strongly criticised by several States' members who believe it is discouraging developers from supplying much-needed new housing.
Critics of GP11 include Deputy John Dyke, who is a member of the Authority.
At that time, Deputy Dyke told Express that he was determined that GP11 would "go back to the States sooner rather than later" because changing it was essential "if we want to get our youngsters into houses".
Also at that time, Deputy Dyke spoke of "things we're looking at possibly changing" and specifically mentioned GP11. "There are various things you could do," he said. "You could scrap it or suspend it or change definitions or change percentages when GP11 applies.”
Pictured: Deputy John Dyke has been hoping to use his membership of the Development & Planning Authority to lead changes to GP11.
But at a hearing held by the Scrutiny Management Committee yesterday, the Authority's most senior members brushed aside any suggestion that proposals could come forward soon to make material change to GP11.
"There are many people out there that actually don’t want GP11 changed. There are some people out there that would like to see it lower. And there are some people out there who would like to see it suspended," said Deputy Oliver.
Deputy Simon Fairclough, the Vice President of the Scrutiny Management Committee and a member of the hearing panel, asked whether more certainty was needed about the current status of GP11.
Pictured: Deputy Simon Fairclough, Vice President of the Scrutiny Management Committee, asked probing questions about GP11 at a hearing with senior representatives of the Development & Planning Authority.
In reply, Deputy Oliver said: "I don’t know how you would make more certainty.
"If you started the review, that would cause a lot of uncertainty. Apart from saying that, at the moment, the Committee is not looking at GP11 and it will be put into the 10-yearly review.
"Whether anything changes in that time, I don’t know. But we haven’t really discussed it as a Committee."
Pictured: Deputy Andrew Taylor, the Vice President of the Development & Planning Authority, went even further than his President and called for more open political support of GP11.
Deputy Taylor said: "I would put my neck out and say that actually giving a bit more backing to GP11 – either in its current state or if there were minor amendments to tweak it...would be a good thing.
"There needs to be a review…and that’s down the road…but I think I’d be agreeing with you and saying that giving more support to it politically would be a good thing."
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