Housing and Planning Minister, Alok Sharma, has unveiled a new £25 million fund to help local authorities boost their planning capacity.

The Planning Delivery fund let councils be able to apply to help gain the skills or capacity they need to deliver housing growth at scale, pace and implement wider planning reforms.

Initially opening up £11 million of the fund, the initiative is part of the Government's plan to raise housing supply to 300,000 per year on average by the mid-2020's.

Other measures announced with the fund include;

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• a further £3m funding to support the delivery of the 14 garden villages that are part of the government’s existing programme, backed by £16m of initial funding. Across England, the government is currently supporting 24 locally-led garden cities, towns and villages, which have the potential to deliver around 220,000 homes.

• publishing a consultation on plans to allow the creation of locally led New Town Development Corporations, and help speed up the delivery of new garden towns

Housing and Planning Minister Alok Sharma said: "Locally-led developments have enormous potential to deliver the scale and quality of housing growth that we need. By supporting our local authorities, we will be able to unlock more homes where people want to live.

"These measures including the £25 million of government support which will help develop new communities that will not only help deliver high-quality well-designed homes, but will also bring new jobs and facilities and a boost to local economies."

(LM/MH)