Planning policy monitoring

Housing Delivery Test

The Housing Delivery Test (HDT) is a way for the government to compare the number of homes being built with the number of homes needed in each local council area.

A HDT report is produced by the government each year based on homes built during the previous 3 years.

The HDT report for 2022, published in December 2023, found 1,370 homes were built in Thurrock between 1 April 2019 and 31 March 2022, compared with 2,969 homes needed – a HDT measurement of 46%.

This measurement is below the requirement for housing delivery set within the GOV.UK: National Planning Policy Framework, which means:

  • we must produce an action plan that says why fewer homes were built than were needed and what we will do to increase and maintain future home building rates – we are currently working on this
  • we must increase deliverable housing sites across the borough by 20%
  • we should presume in favour of sustainable development when deciding planning applications

To download the latest HDT report, go to GOV.UK: Housing Delivery Test – 2022 measurement.

Previous Housing Delivery Test action plans

You can download our action plan for 2019/20, below.