Senator Sam Mézec made the comments after the government published guidance on how the Jersey Development Company should maximise the proportion of affordable homes within the Waterfront redevelopment.
The report says a minimum of 15% of the 1,000 new homes built as part of the scheme should be provided for first-time buyers.
The States recently narrowly voted down a motion of censure brought by Senator Mézec over the Council of Ministers’ ‘failure’ to produce the report by the end of April – in line with an amended proposition.
At the time, Chief Minister John Le Fondré said it was ‘not a matter we have taken lightly’, after Senator Mézec argued the government had missed several chances to produce the guidance following the initial deadline.
Speaking to the JEP, Senator Mézec said the now-published report had still failed to meet his expectations.
He said: ‘This report has been months coming and has missed multiple deadlines. So to now find out their ambitions don’t stretch further than just 15% of the homes to be affordable, is extremely disappointing – because it means by default that they’re aiming for 85% of the homes [to be] unaffordable.’
He added: ‘The government promised to do this work by the end of April, and showed contempt for the States by taking five months longer without providing an apology or reasonable excuse. The fact is that this Alliance Party-led government has an appalling record on seeking to end our housing crisis, and their disinterest in using this particular development to help solve it is just another failure to add to the list.’
When asked if the 15% affordable housing allocation was good enough, he said: ‘The government has 2,000 applications on their first-time buyers waiting list, and has building targets which already fall well short of meeting this demand. To now say that only 150 out of the 1,000 homes planned for the site will be for first-time buyers shows how poor their ambitions are.’
Jersey’s most recent house price index showed that the average cost of properties in the Island had reached £629,000, compared to £574,000 for the previous quarter and £532,000 12 months earlier.
