The South-East england Development Agency hopes to tempt one-parent families and single people to live in the region's town centres in a bid to kick-start urban renewal.
The initiative will involve working in partnership with the South-eastern councils and the Housing Corporation.

It could therefore form a model for the new working relationship between regional bodies and social landlords, called for last week by deputy prime minister John Prescott (HT 25 July, page 7).

SEEDA chief executive Anthony Dunnett forecast that, of the 30,000 homes the region will need over the next decade, 80% would need to be for single people or single-parent families.

Also, the regional development agency's brownfield land assembly trust has been successfully piloted and will be rolled out across the region "by Christmas", Dunnett said.

The agency will use its links with the business community and local government to identify potential sites for infill developments – housing schemes on small patches of unused land such as run-down car parks and fly-tipping sites. "We will assemble derelict land and buildings in cities and towns, package them together and create a critical mass that will be attractive to contractors," said Dunnett. "We can use small sites that are not commercially viable. They will dramatically improve the urban environment and make an asset out of a liability."

SEEDA will work in partnership with regeneration quango English Partnerships to make these sites viable for development. "We have been working closely with the corporation and we will meet with English Partnerships in the next few weeks to discuss what its new role will be," Dunnett said.

English Partnerships was last week given a new role in turning around brownfield sites by Prescott, and has a new gap-funding scheme to encourage developers to recycle land for housing (HT 25 July, page 9).