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.

Affordable Housing: That seven years of government was nearly reduced to a bitter meme reflects disappointment with Conservative broken promises

Conservative flagship housing policies have yet to deliver anything even resembling an affordable housing market where young people can get their foot on the ladder.

When the phrase "No Deposit Required" started trending on social media on Sunday, there was a rumble of excitment. Unfortunately, it was not trending for the reason that people, momentarily, thought it was (it was actually a gambling promotion).

The mistaken belief was that it was a brave new housing policy announcement, with an level of ambition that might make a real dent in the housing crisis. A policy that might really help make home ownership affordable.

The trend quickly became filled with the same joke - "I thought this was a housing policy, but..." - and, for a moment, seven years of government teetered on the brink of being reduced to a single bitter meme.

That disappointment is dangerous for such a weak government and, that it spread so easily in a free form moment, is a big threat to a party that relies so heavily on well practised, old media control over the message and tone of politics.

The Conservatives rely on controlling public discourse and their grip is slipping. That is a sign of Conservative failure, symbolised by Philip Hammond's Autumn Budget in which he promised help to young people toward owning homes.

The breakdown of his signature offer of cutting stamp duty for first time buyers, however, is a narrow policy whose benefit will mostly be helpful to those who are already home owners - a key Conservative audience - and beyond a narrow group, may actually lead to homes being more expensive.

While Hammond put his faith in tinkering around the edges, with some subtle shifts in regulation, it's clear that out there in the public imagination tackling the growing crisis of affordable housing is going to take bigger ideas.

The fact that there was excitment about a policy of no deposits when buying a house - a policy that would come at an extraordinary cost, even for renters - shows just how far the May-Hammond government is from the scale of response the public is expecting.

For Jeremy Corbyn and John McDonnell, that will be music to their ears - perhaps a sign that their message is getting through or has a receptive audience. However, Labour is not free from singeing by the burn of this particular trending topic.

Housing is an issue that no party has adequately dealt with - not even William Beveridge, when he drew his ideas for the welfare system, had an answer for housing.

Homes are too expensive and the growth and security of incomes is low and sliding. Land and property remain archaic, rentier dominated, sectors - cartels like great spiders sat in webs in the midst our economy, catching our resources, extracting and hoarding them.

Conservative failures and broken promises have fed disappointment that risks turning bitter. Progressives must take seriously the need to unravel these webs, and push out the fat lazy spiders, on which so much of our economic potential is snagged.