I’m genuinely torn on the government’s new house building policy: 100,000 Starter Homes for first time buyers, each sold with a 20% discount.
On the one hand, I think it’s great that the policy uses a zoning power to make land available more cheaply to build much needed homes. We’ve been advocating something similar as part of a much broader house building programme. It’s also great that the policy helps priced-out first time buyers with a very substantial 20% … Read more
The Government today published its proposals to review the housing standards in the hope that this will ‘free up the building industry, support growth and get high quality homes built’. Over 100 standards currently available to local councils, such as Lifetime Homes, face abolition.
For the handful of housing standards that will be kept, councils will only be able to apply them after conducting ‘a rigorous viability and need assessment’. While this will undoubtedly cut red tape, it’s … Read more
On Monday, Theresa May’s government announced a shake-up of planning rules, including a new version of the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF). The aim is to get more homes built, as pretty much everyone now accepts that this is the best way to tackle the housing crisis.
Over the coming weeks, we will go through all these proposed planning changes with a fine-toothed comb to work out just what they mean for the supply of genuinely affordable homes. But for … Read more
Parliament must look long and hard at the potential impacts of the Government’s proposed Pay to Stay policy, part of the Housing and Planning Bill.
Shelter is not against the principle of some social housing tenants paying slightly higher rents, depending on their income and household need. But we are very concerned that doing it in this way risks taking a sledgehammer to a nut and finding there is little of the nut left at the end.
Under … Read more
Shelter’s Chief Executive Campbell Robb welcomes Kris Hopkins MP and Emma Reynolds MP to their new roles…
Dear Minister and Shadow Minister,
Congratulations on getting the best jobs in government and opposition. Housing is now a top 5 issue among voters, higher than education, crime or Europe. From ‘generation rent’ shunted from one expensive, unstable let to another, to homeless families stuck in B&Bs, to parents struggling to fund their kids from the Bank of Mum and Dad, … Read more
Blimey. I’m quite used to my policy ideas being roundly abused by one set of people or another – in fact it’s not a bad test of an idea’s salience: if no-one at all is outraged it’s probably a non-starter.
But I’m not sure I can remember a policy that has attracted quite such a thorough a kicking as George Osborne’s Help to Buy mortgage guarantee scheme.
We’ve always argued that profligate lending to struggling households desperate to get on … Read more
Baby boomers have had a bit of an image problem lately. The ‘boomer’ generation born in the post-war period is (by and large) prospering after a prolonged period of economic growth (data geeks might want to refer to this (£) fascinating graph by the FT).
Younger generations, meanwhile, are increasingly fed up: fewer good jobs and pensions, and an unaffordable housing market that holds them back.*
It’s almost universally acknowledged that soaring house prices played a major role … Read more