In a bid to reduce the waiting time for houses, Nuneaton and Bedworth Borough Council are trailblazing the use of modular homes
Councillor Barry Longden, cabinet member for housing at the Town Hall, said that other councils are now asking them for advice on using prefabricated houses.
He said the council built four new homes in Bedworth in just ten weeks and they hope to build more in a bid to slash the waiting time for houses in the area.
Longden said: “This authority is currently in the lead across the country, our information is that we are well in the lead and all of a sudden some other people are starting to play catch up and will be looking for expertise from us.
“Because we are where we are we can start to look at building these properties and giving people homes and I would like to thank our staff and commend them for the work they have done and the position they have put us in, in the national scene.
“We are leading, that is a star for us, we are always going to have knockers, those who can’t accept that this is a good borough and a good place to be.
“But I think the officers have done a magnificent job on this, hopefully, we are going to get some houses built, it is not going to take over the housing list, but we will be biting into it.”
He said the ‘Right to buy‘ policy is having an impact on the number of council homes being available but he added: “Hopefully we will be able to build more than we actually sell, if we don’t, it is not our fault and we are still providing homes at an affordable rent.”
Councillor Keith Kondakor echoed the praise, saying: “Housing is one of the areas that I think that the council has done quite well at.
“I watch Grand Designs I saw modular houses years and years ago and now it is coming into its time.
“I am really pleased we are going to get a framework in place to build these and we should be taking up where developers are taking a ridiculously long time to finish things, could we take a corner of a plot back to actually put some modular houses down?”
You can find more information on modular construction here.
