The alternative to building lots of homes in many places is build lots of homes in a few places: this would certainly lessen, or at least limit, the political penalty involved.
“Carpe Diem”, Boris – get London building. Creating streets can be good for London, and good for you.
There are plenty of ways to solve the problem – what’s needed is the political will.
Alex Morton is Research Director for Housing, Planning and Urban Policy at Policy Exchange. The issue of social housing was a key part of the recent Spending Review. Mark Prisk, the Housing Minister, is to be congratulated on having struck a sensible balance between supporting the sector and requiring that it uses its assets in a […]
Alex Morton is Research Director for Housing, Planning and Urban Policy at Policy Exchange. Today, Policy Exchange publishes a new report, Housing and Intergenerational Fairness, looking at the best way to house Britain’s ageing population and contrasting it with a report out by the Fabians arguing for higher taxes on property. Housing and other costs can […]
Alex Morton is Head of Housing and Planning at Policy Exchange. These days, politics is a gloomy business. Politicians talk of endless austerity and squeezed middles. The general public despair of the main parties. Unfortunately, this pessimism is often justified. Consider housing. The low level of housing (last year we started construction of just 100,000 […]
Alex Morton is Research Director for Housing, Planning and Urban Policy at Policy Exchange. Terrible news. There is no other way to describe the fact that housing starts fell by 11% in 2012 to below 100,000 new homes a year. The current deplorable state of affairs is also depressingly predictable. In 2010, in Making Housing Affordable, […]
Alex Morton is Senior Research Fellow for Housing & Planning at Policy Exchange. On Tuesday, Andrew Lilico argued there is no shortage of housing in London and the South East. His evidence was “a surplus of dwellings over households”. He pleaded “Will everyone stop talking about a housing shortage”. Now, Andrew is a great guy (and […]
Alex Morton is Senior Research Fellow for Housing & Planning at Policy Exchange. Housing policy is failing. There is no other way to describe it. We built just over 100,000 homes last year and it is likely to be even lower this year. The Barker Review argued as a minimum we need to build 250,000 […]
Alex Morton is Senior Research Fellow for Housing and Planning at Policy Exchange There is agreement across the Coalition that we need a better housing market. But we don’t just need that: we need a better housing debate. Today’s series of articles in the Independent illustrate why. First, it seems to believe that home ownership […]
Mutualised planning teams could develop and sell world-leading expertise, for example in heritage, or rural, or high-rise, or low-energy development.