I was dismayed when the Spring Budget was announced to realise that it made almost no mention of housing. Besides a few pounds spent on a couple of homes for veterans and some funding of questionable significance to support clearer routes for housing developers to deliver “nutrient neutral” sites to meet planning obligations – funding that did not even make its way into the Chancellor’s speech – it did not feature. This is despite the housing crisis being one of this country’s most pressing challenges.
Perhaps the Government did not think that it is a pressing enough issue. Or, perhaps, they lacked good ideas to announce. Whichever of those it is, “Home Advantage: A new centre-right vision for housing” could not come at a better time. The essay collection, produced by Bright Blue and sponsored by Shelter, is full of interesting ideas, and brings further light to the need for rapid, radical action on the part of the Government.
The first section, “Security,” – which follows a foreword by the Rt Hon Michael Gove MP, an introduction from the Founder of Bright Blue, Ryan Shorthouse, and Polly Neate CBE, the Chief Executive of Shelter –begins with an essay by David Simmonds CBE MP. He encourages local authorities to act as developers in their own right, as they did in the 1950s and 60s. They could do this again with devolution, as seen through the examples of the West Midlands and Tees Valley.
In that, perhaps local authorities would do well to listen to some of the ideas that Shaun Bailey MP and the Rt Hon Damian Green MP advocate for in their essays. As increasingly many people live in unaffordable, poor-quality homes, 1.2 million persons are still on the social home waiting list; Shaun Bailey berates this lack of support for social housing and calls for an additional 90,000 social homes a year.
Damian Green, on the other hand, wants more homes designed for retirement living; 81% of over 65s live in homes that are too big and expensive for them to maintain. If those people were encouraged to move into specially-designed homes for the elderly, they could free up their larger homes for big, young families to move into. The effect of this on housing demand would be equivalent to delivering 50,000 homes each year.
