Government turns to finger-pointing as it puts pressure on firms and councils to deliver on it's new homes promises

Photograph: Scaffold Repair Construction from Pixabay (License) (Cropped)

It seems that the government has woken up to the need to act on domestic issues. And yet, with the pressure on, the government has decided to start by pointing the finger at others.

Theresa May's ministry, and it's predecessor, have made some major pledges on housing that have not been met. Pledges of several hundreds of thousands of new homes a year that have not been delivered - as admitted by Housing Secretary Sajid Javid last year in a review.

So the government has laid it's plan to tackle this. On Sunday, the Javid issued a warning, via The Sunday Times, that the government would be putting pressure on councils to meet it's targets - prefacing plans to change up it's framework to push even higher targets, set against affordability of local homes.

The aggressive tone was complemented by the threat of stripping from councils decision-making power over what is built in local areas. The threat of intervention is not one that will be taken lightly.

The Prime Minister, today, followed up on Javid's set up to issue a warning to home building firms. She criticised the practice of 'land banking' and announced that firms could be penalised for delays with refusal of planning permission for future projects.

While she acknowledged that young people had a right to be angry - and that, without the 'bank of mum and dad', many would find it impossible to get a foothold on the property - she has answered that anger by shifting the blame to local councils and building firms.

There are real questions about the actual impact of land banking, why firms take so much time to build after planning permission has been received and whether supply is throttled - against which the industry defends itself vigorously.

But even more important are the big questions, that are being ignored, about the government's role in this present crisis. There have been deep cuts to local authority funding. Schemes like help-to-buy have drained social housing stock without adequate restitution or replacement - and driven up prices.

Will pressure on councils and firms to hit higher targets within narrower time frames deliver on policy promises? Or will it just increase the risk of corners being cut?

The Local Government Association (LGA) responded to the government's announcement, and threat of intervention, by saying it was 'misguided' and that the basic block on progress for local authorities was lack of funds with which to build their own homes - for which borrowing powers were needed.

As with Chancellor Philip Hammond's budget, these measures are just tweaks and salves. The Government's blame game isn't addressing the core problems - it's finding scapegoats. That isn't good enough.

There are bigger questions to ask about long term investment, about the role of land and the capture of it's value by a class of rentiers. The government is avoiding these problems in the hope that they'll go away. They won't.

References

Carl Brown's 'Full speech: Sajid Javid introduces the Housing White Paper | WHITE PAPER: Read communities secretary Sajid Javid’s full speech to parliament introducing the Housing White Paper'; on Inside Housing; 8 February 2017.

'Theresa May: Young are 'right to be angry' about lack of homes'; on the BBC; 5 March 2018.

'Councils warned to meet homes targets or lose planning powers'; on the BBC; 4 March 2018.

Ben Chu's 'Labour compulsory purchase orders: Could forced sales of undeveloped land work and is 'land banking' really happening? The proposals come amid widespread claims that speculators and developers are 'land banking' for profit and blocking the delivery of badly-needed new homes'; in The Independent; 2 February 2018.

Patrick Collinson's 'Help to buy has mostly helped housebuilders boost profits: A Morgan Stanley report shows the government’s subsidy has driven up the price of new-build homes – and now it is lining up another £10bn'; in The Guardian; 21 October 2017.

Peter Walker & Anushka Asthana's 'Disused shops could be used to tackle housing crisis, says May: Idea of changing retail spaces into homes follows speech containing only limited solutions'; in The Guardian; 5 March 2018.

'Budget 2017: Cautious Hammond has salves not solutions, as Budget falls short of action'; in The Alternative; 22 November 2017.

Beth Stratford's 'Falling house prices could be the reboot our economy desperately needs. But only if we prepare for a soft landing'; on Open Democracy; 13 February 2018.