Last night’s BBC1 TV debate between the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition, from a housing policy perspective was useful. First it hardly featured, despite the crucial role local councils spatial policy play in promoting or impeding growth viz., pylons to distribute electricity for the next generation of clean cars. And second, the answer the PM gave about housing affordability. It revealed a worrying misunderstanding. If you increase demand, but do not increase supply the price goes up, and after a period cancels out the gain. It is a sterile exercise. He wants to help first time buyers, and don’t we all, simply by providing more funding for them and reducing stamp duty for first time buyers too. And that was it. Up goes demand. He said nothing about supply..
Yes, it was a confrontational debate but in my opinion this unbalanced respond to a contemporary question offers an insight into the calibre of current Conservative thinking, revealed in particular his failure to mention the hard question. Where will the housing go? Starmer’s response was less succinct but more balanced. It is tempting to dismiss this moan as a colourless inability to recognise the constraints for both participants last night. . But the PM’s adolescent answer is part of a pattern so far as housing goes stretching back months. Do I feel more or less inclined to trust his other replies to other issues about which I know little? Housing supply is a difficult political issue. It creates local and national policy conflict. Failure to find an answer has floored governments for decades. The imbalance has become worse over the past fourteen years of Conservative government. Trust in the planning system has declined in this period. One of his predecessors, Theresa May said the system is broken. I see no reason to think a government led by this PM has any idea what to do. They will not get my vote.
Ian Campbell
27 June 2024
