• Only granting 77% of requests- Labour areas granting 88%
• MPs for the areas with lowest rate of approval include former Culture Secretary John Whittingdale and ‘leading Brexiteer’ Kwasi Kwarteng

Property developers are finding it significantly more difficult to get new houses built in areas controlled by Conservative politicians, according to new research from Lendy, Europe’s leading peer to peer secured lending platform.

Lendy says that areas with Conservative local authorities only granted 77% of requests for planning permission in the last year, whilst Labour granted 88% of requests in authorities they control.

All of the four worst local authorities for approval rate of planning permission have Conservative MPs and councils, with eight out of the bottom 20 located in the home counties of Surrey and Essex (See table below).

The lowest approval rate was in Maldon in Essex, followed by Spelthorne in Surrey – both areas have Conservative local authorities and Conservative MPs: former Culture Secretary, John Whittingdale and leading Brexiteer Kwasi Kwarteng.

Housing policy will be an important consideration for the upcoming general election, as the UK continues to feel the pressure of the housing shortage.

Lendy says that it is key that MPs put pressure on local authorities to ensure that they are granting planning permission, as it will go some way towards addressing the housing crisis faced by the UK. The crisis is most severe in the South-East, which means that councils in these areas need to be doing all they can in order provide housing.

Lendy says that areas that see low levels of planning applications granted can often be affected by a vocal minority of local residents who object to new builds near their own houses.

With the Conservative Party winning control of 11 more councils in the recent local council elections, efforts to reduce the housing shortage in the future could be hit, as planning permission may be less likely to be granted.

Property developers need to secure both planning permission and funding for their projects quickly, to meet the demand in housing. Despite using alternative finance, such as P2P, as a means of securing funding, without gaining planning permission, vital projects are not going ahead.

Liam Brooke, co-founder at Lendy says “It is vital that MPs and politicians from all political parties do all they can to address the housing crisis, rather than providing obstacles for developers.”

“Developers often struggle for funding for these important projects and are turning to non-traditional sources, such as P2P in order to fund them. By blocking planning applications, councils are only providing another hurdle.”

“Politicians can be accused of letting Nimbyism to get out of control, as they allow housing projects to be halted due to the opinion of a vocal minority.”

“It is understandable that people would be opposed to large scale building projects on their door steps- but the overall costs to local area of a new development not going ahead can be very substantial in both social and economic terms.”

“Progress towards closing the housing gap is desperately needed and the result of the general election could very well determine how the housing crisis will be addressed in the future.”