BUILDING more council homes has been billed as the best way forward to house Tendring residents.

But Tendring Council housing boss Paul Honeywood said he is waiting for the small print after Prime Minister Theresa May announced plans to scrap the local authority limit on borrowing to build more homes.

Mrs May revealed the plan during her closing speech at the Conservative Party conference in Birmingham, citing it as the way to solve the housing crisis.

It comes after Tendring Council began building ten new homes in Jaywick last summer - five are new council homes and five are set to be starter homes for sale.

In 2013 the council bought six flats in Walton to become council homes and Mr Honeywood said the council has also bought flats back that were sold under the right to buy scheme.

Mr Honeywood said: “We are looking to build more - I’d like to build more quickly but the Government gets in the way.

“The announcement by Theresa May to allow borrowing to build is interesting. But we need to see what the detail on that is, what’s in the small print.”

Tendring Council is now looking into building new council homes in Harwich. Mr Honeywood said another way the council house stock is growing is through homes gifted to the council by developers of new estates.

He said: “I prefer that through section 106 agreements we seek that affordable homes are gifted to the council as we then know they are ours and it means people coming off the housing register.”

Last week the Standard revealed there are 1,300 families on the housing register but only about 30 of the 3,200 council properties are empty at any one time. The register is split into categories with those in most urgent need of council housing in Band A.

Tim Clarke, head of housing and environmental health at Tendring Council, said the Councils Housing Allocations Policy meant those in the greatest housing need received the highest priority on the housing register but additional priority is given to those who work.

A large proportion of applicants are rated as Band B.

But Mr Clarke said the council has a duty to help those at risk of being made homeless and the emphasis is being put on preventing homelessness.

He added: “On April 3 this year a new law came into force, which means we have a duty to assist from 56 days before the person is made homeless, it used to be 21 days.

“But we have always helped earlier than in order to prevent homelessness which could then mean putting people into bed and breakfasts.”

Where someone is not eligible for council properties but are at risk of homelessness the authority can pay the deposit and first month rent for private rented housing.

Mr Clarke said: “Between April 2017 and April 2018, 387 households received financial assistance in this way. Between April this year and now there have been 173.”

But he said there are cases when people don’t accept help with housing and estimated about six people are genuinely homeless in Tendring