<p>Housing targets are set to be a “starting point” rather than mandatory, according to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC).</p> <p>DLUHC has announced amendments to the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill which will see housing numbers become “flexible” and more locally determined. It claimed that targets “remain an <span>important part of the planning system and the government will consult on how these can better take account of local density”.</span><span></span></p> <p><span>This follows housing secretary Michael Gove’s discussions with a group of backbench Conservative MPs, fronted by former environment secretary Theresa Villiers, who called for mandatory housing targets for local authorities - amounting to 300,000 homes per year – to be scrapped. The government’s commitment to this number of homes was part of its 2019 manifesto.</span><span></span></p> <p><span>Neil Jefferson, managing director of the Home Builders Federation, said that the government’s “vague public commitments” to its homes target were “worthless without action”.</span><span></span></p> <p><span>He commented: “</span>If ministers fail to stand up to the anti-business and anti-development section of the Conservative party it is inevitable that housing supply will fall dramatically, costing hundreds of thousands of jobs, slashing GDP and preventing even more people from accessing decent housing.”</p> <p><span>In October, <a href="http://www.house-builder.co.uk/news/hbf-warns-obr-impact-scrapping-housing-targets"><span>HBF wrote …