Leader of Douglas Council has said that the planning process is ultimately to blame for the lack of housing.
Speaking to Manx.News at the government conference, Devon Watson said: “I think those core bottlenecks are the fact that you have to go through intense planning approvals within the council.
“Then you have to go through an approval process with the Department of Infrastructure.”
Planning & Approval
Mr Watson added: “Then that has to go through an approval process within Treasury that has to be reviewed against planning documents as well. The Planning Committee has to view it.
“Then ultimately, banks who grant the loans fundamentally also need to review it so you end up having multiple people down the road, whereas in a place like China, you can just build housing, right? Obviously, not.
“We shouldn’t be there, but there is something to learn from a place where you can build housing if it needs to be done. And in fact, we’ve become so afraid of doing something wrong that often we just don’t do anything at all.”
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