Berkshire's housing targets go through the roof

Denise Gaines, West Berkshire's deputy leader, said the housing target was too high

Councils in Berkshire have been told to build more than 6,800 new homes every year for the next five years by the government.

That figure is nearly 50% higher than the target set by the previous Conservative adminstration. West Berkshire, Wokingham and Windsor and Maidenhead's numbers will go up the most.

West Berkshire has been told to build more than 1,000 new homes every year, more than double the current figure.

Nearly three quarters of the borough sits in an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty so it could prove very difficult to build more than small-scale developments.

Denise Gaines, the council's deputy leader, said the new target was far too high and she wanted to focus on building stronger communities rather than just getting numbers up.

"We've got villages all over west Berkshire that need a few houses, not thousands... just so that the schools stay viable, so the church is still attended, so the pub stays a local pub and doesn't get turned into a home," she said.

"Those are the kind of things we need to think about going forward."

Sir Keir Starmer said he wanted to overhaul the planning system

The government wants 1.5 million new homes built across the country by 2029.

Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said: "Our plans for change will put builders not blockers first, overhaul the broken planning system and put roofs over the heads of working families and drive the growth that will put more money in people's pockets."

Campaigners from the Save Our Loddon Valley Environment group (SOLVE) want to limit the number of new houses built in Wokingham, though the government now wants 1,336 new properties to go up there every year, up from the current figure of 748.

Paul Stevens, from SOLVE, said 1.5 million empty homes in the country should be brought back into use.

He also said more older people should be persuaded to downsize, freeing up properties for growing families.

"I know for a fact that there are people in my family who because of their age live in fairly big houses with a lot of empty rooms," he said.

"Why? They should be encouraged to move out, and that property and that house, or those bedrooms should be rented out."

The government wants to build 1.5 million new homes across the country by 2029

Councils are being told they must hit their numbers. Do that, says the government, and you choose where they go. Miss them and the government says it will build them, taking away a council's right to choose where they go.

Back to the numbers. West Berkshire is being told to build 1,070 extra homes a year, up from 495. In Wokingham it is now 1,336 a year, up from 748 while in the Royal Borough they will have to build even more, up from 866 to 1,449.

In Bracknell, the numbers climb from 828 a year to 1,127 while in Reading they rise from 878 to 1,127. Slough is the only authority to see its housing quota reduce, down from 856 new homes a year to 808.