RICS has responded to the Matthew Taylor Review on the Rural Economy and Affordable Housing on 6 March 2008.

Key recommendations are:

Affordable housing
• Development size thresholds for rural Section 106 payments should be lowered

• Section 106 agreements for smaller developments should pass funding on to community trust to supply land for housing

• Developments over a certain size should be one third for market sale, one third shared ownership and one third social rented

• There should be national guidelines for Section 106 negotiations with specific areas covering rural housing provision

• Section 106 agreements should be used to ensure housing remains affordable

• Staircasing of shared ownership properties should be limited where there is a lack of replacement property

• Links should be created between villages with different amenities to create “village clusters”

• VAT on the renovation and repair of buildings should be reduced from 17.5% to 5%

Rural economy
• Compulsory planning and rural economic training for members of local authority planning committees or encourage LPAs to retain rural professionals

• Planning applications should not be refused due to a lack of access to public transport

• Permitted development rights should be widened to include minor changes when converting existing buildings

• Gap funding for the development of business premises in rural areas should be considered

• A framework for the protection of the best and most versatile agricultural land and biodiversity must be considered in any new development.

Download the RICS position in full from the Word Downloads panel on the right hand side of this page.

For more information contact: James Rowlands(jrowlands@rics.org).