THURROCK is opening its doors to builders and small scale property developers in the hope of sparking an increase in the number of homes built in the borough.

Thurrock Council is significantly behind its targets for new home building but has been selected to be one of just three UK councils to test a new pilot scheme aimed at unlocking development opportunities for delivering housing with small and medium enterprise builders.

From today (Friday, 29 January) the council is inviting businesses to sign up and register their interest in plots of land in the borough. The opportunity to do so will run until March.

The initiative has been launched by Local Partnerships, a joint venture between the Treasury, the Local Government Association and the Welsh Government which helps the public sector deliver projects at local level.

It is primarily aimed at stimulating house building with smaller, local businesses and supporting the local economy as it recovers from the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic.

The council's housing portfolio holder Cllr Barry Johnson said: "This unique opportunity will give the council the potential to unlock even more housing development opportunities and get spades in the ground to drive the transformation of Thurrock, alongside benefiting from the skills of smaller, local builders and supporting the local economy.

"We already engage with development companies and are keen to see smaller, local builders in a position to be able to supply more new affordable homes in our borough and bring further diversity to the range of affordable housing suppliers.

"There is a role for local developers to showcase schemes they can deliver that will meet the council's specifications and budget, on land that developers can buy or already own. The scheme is ideally looking for local builders and developers who typically deliver between three to 10 homes on one site per year.

"If you are interested in being part of this pilot scheme, we encourage you to register your organisation on the council's procurement portal which can be found here."