South Norfolk MP says custom build register rollout ‘great news’ for self builders

South Norfolk MP Richard Bacon has warmly welcomed the government’s announcement that local councils must keep a register of aspiring self and custom builders who want to build their dream home.

Housing Minister Brandon Lewis, Conservative MP for Great Yarmouth, confirmed the news that authorities would be required to keep the register from April 1 this year.

It is just the beginning of a bottom-up revolution which has huge potential to increase the housing supply and to help more people build their dream homes

The legal requirement is contained in the Self-Build and Custom Housebuilding Act 2015, which Mr Bacon guided through the House of Commons as a Private Members’ Bill, and which is now being implemented by the Department for Communities and Local Government.

Mr Bacon also founded the All-Party Group on Self-Build, Custom and Community Housebuilding and Placemaking.

“This is great news for self-build and custom housebuilders,” he said. “It is just the beginning of a bottom-up revolution which has huge potential to increase the housing supply and to help more people build their dream homes.

“Self-build offers great opportunities for local communities to come together to bring forward housing for local people which meets with a warm welcome rather than the mass imposition of new houses which so often provokes protest.

“It is also possible through providing large numbers of serviced plots for custom-build and self-build to be done at considerable scale – a fact so often forgotten – which has been proven to work in Germany and in the Netherlands, and is now starting in the UK, for example, through the exciting work at Graven Hill.

“I congratulate the government for taking this step and I am expecting to see more help for self- and custom-builders emerge from the Housing and Planning Bill in due course.”