Affordable homes 'not remit of urban sites scheme'

Projects approved for funding include the building of 38 flats in Port Erin

The creation of affordable housing is not the responsibility of a scheme designed to promote the redevelopment of disused urban sites, the enterprise minister has said.

Tim Johnston said the Island Infrastructure Scheme was “very specific” in its aim of promoting economic development.

He faced questions over his department’s approval in principle of a grant towards the redevelopment of the former Ocean Castle Hotel site in Port Erin into flats.

The minister said the scheme focused on redeveloping “unoccupied urban sites that are seen as unviable” rather than the island’s affordable housing needs.

Plans for 38 flats on the site of the former hotel were submitted in November last year by the Tevir Group, after the project was named as one of the first to be approved for support under the scheme.

The development was approved for a government grant of up to 10% of the eligible costs under the scheme.

'Significant private investment'

Several MHKs questioned whether the funds could be better spent investing in government housing projects, and suggested the inclusion of affordable homes could be a condition of approval by the scheme.

But Mr Johnston said the initiative did not seek to “interfere” with the “obligations on developers to provide either affordable homes or meet any other requirements laid down by planning and associated policy”.

He told Tynwald members the scheme was about boosting the Manx economy by stimulating the construction industry and creating employment opportunities, and satisfying the needs of the visitor economy.

The idea behind the initiative was to unlock the “potential” of a number of brownfield sites by leveraging “significant private investment”, he said, with “wider work” going on elsewhere in government to tackle other aspects of the island’s housing needs.

“It’s certainly not the Island Infrastructure Scheme’s responsibility to have answers for the broad challenges across housing,” he added.