Affordable Homes Parish Priority Cut To 50%

No more than half of affordable homes on any given Jersey site will be reserved for people with links to that parish.

Until now, everyone with parish links got priority for first-time buyer homes there.

But Deputy Inna Gardiner has won a vote to restrict the parish priority to 50%. 

She describes it as a compromise.

"It can ensure that people who would like to stay and it's really important to stay in the parish and would be willing to wait maybe another five or ten years when the parish will have development will continue.

At the same time, 50% of the residents in the parishes who don't have parish developments will be able to access according to their eligibility and not according to their parish connection."

It doesn't include people aged 55 and over.

It's been agreed as part of the Bridging Island Plan debate.

Deputy Gardiner's first proposition after becoming a States member in 2019 was to remove the parish links completely. It was turned down.

Deputy Kirsten Morel described Deputy Gardiner's middle-ground idea of no more than 50% as 'eminently sensible.'

"I completely understand why parishes want to maintain parish links to new housing, but equally, as Deputy Gardiner puts it so well, we are an island 9x5 and to potentially restrict some rezoned affordable housing areas to purely parish links just seems untenable in today's world where at the end of the day, you jump in the car and you can drive from Corbiere to Gorey in half-an-hour.

As much as many people want to remain in the parishes that they know best, and they will try absolutely to do so, that's where the 50% comes in.

It enables parishes to say yes, half of this housing is for people in this parish already or with strong links to the parish, but we just have to accept that the other half, quite rightly, is open to people on the (Affordable Housing) gateway from all over the island."

Deputy Richard Renouf opposed Deputy Gardiner's first proposal in 2019, but called this alternative idea 'entirely fair', while the Constable of St Ouen, Richard Buchanan, says it's entirely fair and reasonable that half of first-time buyer homes in his parish should go to other islanders.

"We know there's a housing crisis and we know that there are people outside of St Ouen who are absolutely desperate for homes in the same way that I have over 100 people on my list who are absolutely desperate for homes.

So any development that is made in St Ouen, or indeed any parish in my view, should help the island-wide need as well as helping parochial needs."

Senator Lyndon Farnham described it as 'sensible' and 'fair' whilst maintaining some of the parish links and Deputy Steve Luce says this is a good compromise.

Deputy Louise Doublet also supported the proposal.

She calls the concept of parish links 'problematic'.

"Aren't we all linked to all of our parishes in the island? How do we define such links?

I actually feel linked in some way or another to every single parish on this island and I make an effort to spend time in every single parish.

I don't live out my days in a single parish. The woodlands of St Martin, the beaches of St Ouen and I could go on.

I hope that Constables will continue to take increased use of the gateway and not go up to this 50% that Deputy Gardiner is proposing as a maximum that can be allocated, I hope it will be much lower and that the Constables, when they are creating these fantastic developments, will go by need and that will take priority."

Deputy Gardiner's proposal was approved by 38 votes to two.

The Constable of St Brelade and Constable of St Mary voted against it.

Constable John Le Bailly says he believes that all parishioners should have priority for homes in their parish.

The Bridging Island Plan debate continues.