Pickles blames lack of willpower among authorities for failure to tackle ‘beds in sheds’

There has been a lack of willpower among local authorities to tackle the issue of “beds in sheds”, the Communities Secretary has claimed.

Eric Pickles’ comments came after a question from Labour MP Kerry McCarthy, who said many of her constituents came to her “utterly frustrated that dwelling houses are being built in people’s back gardens, clearly by flaunting the planning guidance”.

In response the Communities Secretary said Housing Minister Grant Shapps had recently met with a number of local authorities to look into ways of dealing with the problem.

But he added: “There are more than adequate existing powers to deal with it, and as she rightly points out, the issue has been a lack of willpower. One authority—I shall not name it—has, frankly, let this get out of hand in a two-year process, so that the problem is now very difficult indeed to deal with.”

Pickles also said during the session that the second version of the National Planning Policy Framework would be published “very soon”.

The oral question and answer session also saw Shapps reveal that he would issuing a booklet shortly bringing together all the powers for dealing with rogue landlords.