A DELAY of more than two years to the construction of social housing in Cutteslowe has been blamed on a lack of cash by council chiefs.

Plans for 17 homes at the Elsfield Hall site, in Elsfield Way, were approved in 2014 but work has still not started.

Labour’s Mike Rowley, executive board member for housing at Oxford City Council, said it was because changes introduced by the Government had ‘significantly reduced resources for investment in new housing’.

He added: “This very regretfully has delayed this particular development.”

The homes in Elsfield way had been part of the city council’s housebuilding plans, but Mr Rowley said they would now be led by a housing company set up by the local authority earlier this year.

It has been bankrolled by the council but was set up as an independent organisation.

Referring to the Elsfield Hall site in a response to a written question by councillor Stephen Goddard, Mr Rowley added: “In order to bring forward this and other sites the council has now established our own housing company and we intend to include the funding for loans to the company within the draft budget, so the much needed affordable housing can be delivered as soon as possible.”

Liberal Democrat Mr Goddard said the 17 homes were a ‘relatively modest but still important contribution to Oxford’s affordable housing need’.

The council’s west area planning committee approved plans for the development at a meeting on July 21, 2014.