Taunton residents hoping to move into newly built Council Houses will have to wait longer than expected. Why? Because they have no-one to build them. Builders are surprisingly in short supply in the west country despite the coasts of Cornwall and Devon seeing major influxes of money in recent years on private developments. Unfortunately, the previous 90 council houses and housing association flats have already been bulldozed.

The reasons that the council gave for the delay are “a national shortage of construction labour, additional asbestos found on site, unexpected gas main found on site and retaining wall issues on the eastern boundary of the site”.

Given the set back the council will now monitor the developers progress on a weekly basis after they asked for a contract extension.