A new report calling for a more radical approach to tackling the housing crisis has been welcomed by the authorities behind the North Essex Garden Communities.

Written by Conservative MP Neil O’Brien - Green, Pleasant and Affordable - calls for a move away from a piecemeal approach to housing, and a shift in focus to the creation of new communities and not just homes.

The report, published by Think Tank Onward, suggests giving councils the power to purchase land and offering incentives for authorities which take a long-term approach.

Graham Butland, leader of Braintree Council, welcomed the findings of the paper.

He said: “The report highlights the need to look at a new approach to how we meet the needs of future generations.

“I have spoken in the past about the rise of a hidden homeless generation living across North Essex and that is why the Garden Community approach is so critical.

“The fact that the number of 18 - 30s now living in their parents’ homes has increased by 1.1 million, and that nearly half of men aged 22 - 26 live with their parents, is something that should make us all sit up and take notice.

“The alternative is either doing nothing, or simply tagging homes here and there, and that really isn’t an alternative.”

A ten point plan is suggested in the report to increase home-ownership and house building in the UK.

Amongst the suggestions is giving councils borrowing power in order to allow them to buy land and therefore grant planning permission.

John Spence, chairman of North Essex Garden Communities Ltd, said the report explained garden communities were the way to tackle the “very real” housing crisis.

He also said the north Essex authorities’ “holistic” approach to housebuilding was backed up by Mr O’Brien’s ten point plan.

Mr Spece said: “This has to be a better and more sustainable model than the piecemeal approach that we see at the moment and councils need to be given support in enabling them to take a more innovative approach to how they provide new homes.

“But of course any new community also needs to be viable – and residents have to be at the heart of it.

“That means over the coming months we intend to increase our level of engagement across the area.”

Visit thinkhouse.org.uk/2018/onward.pdf.