A CRISIS meeting to address housing issues affecting many communities in West Somerset has been held in Minehead.

It was organised by West Somerset Community Land Trust (WSCLT) on what happened to be International CLT Day and was attended by members, representatives of many of the local councils in the area, West Somerset MP Liddell-Grainger, and the public.

Opening the meeting, WSCLT chairman Maureen Smith said: “It is important to define the housing shortage - many people are living in inappropriate housing, causing wellbeing and financial problems for themselves and the community.

“This will then have to be paid for by public funds.

“It is better in every way to provide sufficient decent sustainable homes.

“There is no ‘silver bullet’ to reduce the housing crisis but a series of measures need to be implemented.”

WSCLT was set up six years ago to acquire sites on which to build sustainable, affordable, and permanent homes for local people.

“We have investigated over 40 sites but none have so far proved viable,” Ms Smith said. “Hence, this meeting.”

Somerset West and Taunton Council (SWT) housing portfolio holder Cllr Fran Smith said: “My hope was to deliver housing in this area. After four years of little progress we have finally started construction of 54 carbon neutral houses in Minehead.”

However, she acknowledge the problems remained acute.

“Young people cannot afford to live on Exmoor and older people need their services,” she said.

“We need to look at the wider area – the problem is not unique to rural areas.”

WSCLT secretary Hester Watson said: “There used to be a few people being evicted every year but now there are many.

“One elderly couple were told their rent would be going up by 50 per cent to £1,000 per month.

“Until recently people could find somewhere to go but now they cannot.

“Some are living in tents, caravans, a lot are living in very unsatisfactory conditions and nobody is producing solutions.”

The meeting heard applicants found Homefinder, the computer-based system run by councils to register housing need, extremely difficult to use.

One applicant reported finding only one house available with a huge waiting list, and another could not find anything for their large family.

Will Lock, chairman of Exmoor Young Voices, a group set up to help young people on Exmoor to find housing, said: “Homefinder is far too clumsy.

“Young people cannot afford the rents anyway.

“The main frustration is the lack of urgency and action is needed now.”

The meeting was told a problem in future would be the requirement for landlords to increase the energy performance of their homes by April, 2027.

Ms Watson said: “This is not possible with many local older buildings.

“It will mean more landlords evicting tenants or raising the rent to unaffordable levels.

“People would prefer to live in a lower standard dwelling than face eviction.”

SWT and Minehead town Cllr Marcus Kravis said it was important to establish real need.

He said: “With interest rates increasing, landlords with buy-to-let mortgages will face rising costs which will mean evictions or rents going up. We need to be prepared for that.”

Ms Watson said the action should start with what people needed.

“There is an acute shortage of one-bed housing because nobody wants to build it,” she said.

Peter Bate, of the National Trust Tenants Association, said councils should compulsorily purchase land.

However, Ms Smith noted councils could not afford to do this but could broker a sale between owner and buyer, although this had never happened.

Colin McDonald, SWT affordable housing enabler for Exmoor National Park, said any system used by a council was governed by legislation.

There had to be a check on how public funds were used and there has never been a perfect system.

Rather than compulsory purchase, it would be better to restrict use of land.

Local housing developer Chris Winter said the increasing cost of building materials was adding to developers’ problems in making housing truly affordable.

Small rural schemes might need an extra £200,000 to £300,000 because of the need to provide services such as access and power.

He said it was a vicious circle that somehow had to be subsidised and required joined-up thinking.

Mr Liddell-Grainger said local government had been asked to build 200,000 houses.

However, he said: “Can we? No we cannot, as suitable land is in short supply, especially on Exmoor.”

Homes England did have funds but it was difficult to access and had time limits.

There was concern that the Community Housing Fund would not be supported in future.

Ms Smith said the business tax status of holiday lets needed to be clarified as there were massive discount claims during lockdown resulting in huge costs to councils.

Second home owners already paid a higher council tax, and Mr Bate said it should be increased even further and the money used solely for housing.

SWT Cllr Loretta Whetlor, from Watchet, suggested limiting the number of holiday homes in each village rather than imposing a blanket ban as it was important to sustain tourism.

WSCLT board member Graham Kennedy said the main group buying more expensive property in the area was the 65-75 age group.

He said: “One solution would be to regulate housing density, obliging developers to build smaller, but well-designed houses.”

Obligations for developers to provide affordable houses were often avoided said Cllr Whetlor, who gave an example of the plans to build 400 homes on the Watchet Paper Mill site, of which 140 should have been affordable, but the number was reduced to zero because the developer used the cost of de-contaminating the land to avoid the requirement.

SWT and Somerset county Cllr Stephen Pugsley said: “There is a high proportion of protected landscapes in this county, but the National Park Local Plan does allow for housing for local people.”

Cllr Smith said the good news was that the new unitary Somerset Council would be a housing authority.

Mr Liddell-Grainger suggested a subsidy for small affordable rural developments could be a unitary authority policy. Small-scale village schemes could unlock money.

Cllr Smith mentioned a scheme to set up local events at villages looking at jobs as well as houses.

This was stopped by Covid but could be restarted by the forthcoming unitary council.

WSCLT has produced a document setting out the case for declaring a housing emergency and outlining measures that could be taken both locally and nationally to alleviate the situation.

Mr Liddell-Grainger said he was willing to lobby the Government on the measures in the document, which included reinstating support for the provision of social and affordable rented homes, increasing funding via Homes England, moderating the ‘right to buy’ provision, providing support and funding of refurbishment of existing buildings to provide low cost homes, allowing councils to charge a high rate of council tax on second and empty homes, regulating holiday homes and clarifying their business status, and providing Government support for retrofitting of existing homes, including private rentals, to ensure energy efficiency.

A motion put to WSCLT members, ‘should WSCLT work with other parties in the West Somerset area to declare a housing emergency on behalf of the many people having increasing difficulty finding a long-term sustainable home in their community?’ was passed unanimously.

The meeting agreed WSCLT should approach Somerset Association of Local Councils (SALC) to instigate a joint action group to demand a housing emergency was declared by SWT and later by Somerset Council, and to prioritise measures which would have the fastest and greatest benefit.

The action group would include all the organisations and individuals which wanted to support it.

Contact would be made with SALC this week and all interested parties kept informed.