How can I put this? Your idea of local democracy?
Q. You don’t want houses near you?
A. No. They need to go somewhere more appropriate, more sustainable.
Q. Fine. I agree. Snag is the residents in the host location you suggest reckon their house prices will fall 10%. They want you to pay them the difference.
A. (Snorting noises off). . What planet are they on?
Q. Well, they say the value of your homes will be 10% higher because they have accepted your housing overspill. I can see they have a point. Can’t you?
A. The two are not the same. Our village is unique. It must be preserved. The suggestion I am a nimby in disguise I utterly reject. For years I have supported local and national conservation policies. I am a conservationist through and through.
Q. Are you…..humm! One of the local youngsters in the host location also reminded me of the tax free cash bonanza you and I enjoyed over the last few decades. In Berkshire he brutally pointed out that new buyers pay 10x or more of their salary to buy smaller and smaller homes. In the sixties and seventies we paid two or three times salary-don’t you remember?
A. Yes, here he has a point. Frankly I am worried about the country’s weak growth rate and whether UK productivity is keeping up with competitive locations elsewhere. Heaping high levels of mortgage debt on the next generation will be a burden for them and a drag of the domestic economy. Is there a conflict here between local priorities and the national priorities? And if so, how can these conflicts be resolved? After all local residents live with the results, good or bad!
Q. Good point. Deciding where new homes go is not a party political issue. It is a spatial and sustainability issue. Obviously five year electoral cycles with the risk of policy U-turns are unhelpful too.. New rural communities and new urban regeneration projects take years to plan and years to build. Should we take housing out of party politics? But how?
A. I have two suggestions. We either re-adopt the Commission for New Towns post WW2 delivery model, or go and learn from England’s landed estates, which have been providing new premium value places to go and places to visit for generations. Look at Poundbury, promoted by the Crown Estate, so popular new buyers will pay 30% premiums to live there, rather than in nearby Dorchester. They must be getting something right!
Q. Is this too good to be true? Or is it simply too difficult? Sounds like the choice is between confrontation today or cooperation tomorrow.
Ian Campbell
27 April 2023
