Boris Johnson’s government should do more to help local communities accept and welcome new developments in its review of planning laws, says Swindon Borough Council’s cabinet member for strategic infrastructure and planning, Gary Sumner.

Meanwhile the Labour spokesman on the environment and planning Jane Milner-Barry says a way must be found to make housing more affordable and more available.

Michael Gove the new Secretary for Housing last week announced a pause on the government’s proposed new planning law just a week before the proposed legislation’s expected publication.

Its intention was to make building houses easier, with areas divided into three: growth zones on the edge of towns where building houses would be encouraged and made easier, renewal zones- brownfield sites in already- built up areas which need a revamp, and protected zones- the greenbelt and areas of countryside.

The proposals seem to have worried many Conservatives, particularly in the traditional heartlands of southern suburbs and look set to be changed.

Coun Sumner said: “The fact the government has paused this is significant. The direction of travel didn’t find favour with a lot of Conservative MPs and the pause is positive, it shows they are listening.”

The two main points the Swindon planning boss would make to Mr Gove are about helping communities and their councils welcome development, and making it easier to develop harder to use brownfield sites.

He said: “Developers pay for things like extra infrastructure: a new school or a new doctor’s surgery. They don’t make a financial contribution to the community or council that is taking the new houses. Financially stretched councils don’t get any extra money now it has to clean the new streets or collect the bins or open a new library.”

As land value rises when house building is given permission, Coun Sumner feels some of that money should go to the council: “There must be a way to assess the value of the land before planning permission, then the value of the land after consent is given and pass some of that extra value to the council which helped in making it so much more valuable.

“It think that would help communities welcome new developments - new housing should not be a burden on the host communities that are taking it.”

He’d also like to see extra help for councils and developers to get brownfield sites in the centre of town revamped. It’s well known that many developers often prefer to build houses on new greenfield sites as it is easier cheaper and more profitable than trying to convert the site of an ex-factory in the centre of town.

Coun Sumner said: “There are plenty of land-owners who have a site and would like to bring it forward, but they can’t because it wouldn’t be viable economically at the moment. Councils like Swindon want more housing in towns. It should be possible to use tax-breaks to encourage that and make it easier." In a linked point, Coun Sumner would like the permitted development rules allowing conversions of offices into flats scrapped: "There are so many offices block that have come to the end of their life being converted. If it wasn't allowed, and it was easier to bring forward brownfield sites, that would be much more useful."

Coun Sumner’s opposition counterpart Labour's Jane Milner-Barry saw the change of Mr Gove's title to Secretary for levelling up, housing and communities, omitting 'local government' as: "a symptom of the contempt in which this government holds local government."

She said just making it easier to build houses would not make housing cheaper: "We have 4,500 people on the housing waiting list in Swindon, and people everywhere spend far too much on their housing and it damages the economy.

"It's not in the developers interests to lower housing costs, you could build on the whole of southern England and the price wouldn't come down.

"We have to find a way of making housing more affordable and more available, not just build more houses for sale at £300,000."