House building (Debate)

Fri 26 Jul, 14:12

"Pooled historic cost" - the utter nub of council/public housing economics. The Great Con Artist managed to persuade the working class (that was...) about who paid for their houses. cf my old drinking chum's book "The Property Machine", Peter Ambrose. Still relevant after all these years.

Fri 19 Jul, 21:45

Maybe the “right” to buy subsidised housing should be linked to an obligation to pay capital gains tax on the profit on resale? The exchequer could then recoup some of the rent subsidies and recycle the rest into maintaining / expanding social housing stock.

Fri 19 Jul, 18:00

There really is no point in "legislation preventing a future government from" doing anything at all. Because the next government will change the law, if it judges change to be in EITHER its, or the nation's interest. Think, for example, of the Fixed Term Parliament Act.

The only way of binding future parliaments is by inventing a written constitution. And, however wonderful such a thing may sound to media columnists, real voters, in the real world, will inevitably have higher priorities than trying to agree on tomes of micromanagement such as  America's Founding Fathers dumped on successive generations. 

Or to summarise the argument against the idea more pithily: "The Right to Bear Arms"

Fri 19 Jul, 17:09

It’s not irrelevant.  If we all agree that the public purse needs to build houses, which I think we do, there must be legislation to prevent a future government from selling them.  Has ‘right to buy’ been extended to housing associations?  I think it was proposed.  It should be stopped now.  

My point is that the private sector will not be the solution because they have profit margins to maintain and when they are asked to build a % of “affordable” housing their response is to build small developments below the threshold and restrict the supply to artificially inflate the value of all housing.  This maintains their profit margins, increases the amount of mortgages required and increases rental values.  What’s not to like!  Lots.

Fri 19 Jul, 15:48

There's a weird irony in pointing fingers of blame at the major parties over this.

Selling council homes started in 1980, and through the 1980s hovered around 100,000 homes a year. They fell off during Major's PMship to around 40,000 annually - then increased  under Blair to around 70,000 a year, but almost disappeared under Brown.

Though Labour roasted Cameron for announcing the resumption of sales, sales under the then MP for here never even came close to the level managed under Blair - though by the time Cameron made his announcement, it's possible that the level of for-rent social housing in some areas (like WODC) was so tiny severe hardship was being caused by trying to scrap what was left.

But arguing about selling social housing is all a tad academic now, because there's so little left - and it's pushing 20 years since Blair was a political force. The question has to be "how do you build enough affordable housing now?" - in a very different world from when Blair presided over all sorts of thnigs many of us now dislike. 

Fri 19 Jul, 07:12

If it was just Tory dogma preventing the re-building of Council housing why didn't 13 years of Labour Government stop the problem?  The housing that you and I paid for was sold at below market price - an average over the years of 40% below market price.  So the houses could never have been replaced.

Tax payers, the public, we paid for this housing.  It is our housing.  It was flogged off cheap and most of it fell into the hands of exploitative landlords.  That was a mistake.

Instead, the private sector is being required to build "lower-cost housing".  They won't do that because it impacts on their profits and shareholder value.  So what do they do - they restrict the supply, releasing it slowly to market which increases the cost of all housing artificially.  A bonanza for the money lenders and the house-builders.  A disaster for families and the next generation.

Wed 17 Jul, 11:18

I am deeply sceptical about Labour's plans for house building. Developers are profit making enterprises and therefore want to sell houses for as high a price as they can which is why they challenge local authorities over the number of affordable homes they have to build. I will be interested to hear how the new government is going to change that.  Until local authorities are given the powers to build social and affordable housing on a not for profit or minimal profit basis the problem will not be solved

Tue 16 Jul, 09:10

I don’t think right to buy was wrong What was wrong was that the money generated should have gone to build more publicly owned houses but Tory dogma prevented this happening

Tue 16 Jul, 09:00

This morning on the radio there was an announcement about the targets to be achieved for annual house building.  The private sector house-builders will be responsible for achieving this target.

My limited understanding is that the faster you increase the supply of a product the lower the price you can demand for it.  Private sector house-builders are only interested in profit and keeping the price of housing artificially high.  They will blame anyone and anything, currently the planning rules, to avoid building so many houses, so fast, that the price falls.  The Labour target will fail and Labour will blame it on the private sector, planning, NIMBY's, NATO targets, etc.  Excuses, excuses.

The only way for Labour to achieve its ambitious targets is to build publicly owned housing and never to sell it off cheaply for private profit.  That was a Conservative policy designed to buy voters and reduce the size of the state.   If we have to allow 'right to buy' then the property must be sold back to the state when the purchaser no longer lives there in order to stop raiding the tax money pot.  Am I wrong again?