Last September the National Housing Federation announced a voluntary Right to Buy deal with the government, ostensibly as a way of stopping housing associations being re-classified as public bodies by the ONS. The fact that this would require councils to sell off their high-value stock to fund the discounts did not seem to perturb the NHF, who were accused of “collaboration” by a senior local government figure. But the ONS had already decided to re-classify associations into the public sector on the basis of the 2008 Housing Act. This has prompted the government to announce a range of de-regulatory measures that go well beyond the status quo ante and will, at some unknown future date, take associations back into the private sector – a move that has been warmly welcomed by the NHF. The NHF has consistently declined to answer questions about what they knew of the ONS decision, and, given recent events in the Lords, whether it was really necessary to offer a voluntary deal. (See here and here.) So either, the NHF strategy was astonishingly incompetent, or subtly brilliant – I leave you to decide. Continue reading →

Last year I wrote about Rustat Road in Cambridge where Persimmon Homes had acquired a 1.2 hectare site for £9 million with a section 106 agreement in place to build 30 percent affordable housing. They pled poverty under the government’s 2013 appeal procedures. The City Council reduced the affordable housing requirement to 6 percent and Persimmon promptly sold the site for £15 million to another developer. So far so scandalous. Continue reading →

It’s disappointing that both Sadiq Khan and Zac Goldsmith in their campaigns to be London’s next mayor have pledged to leave London’s green belt untouched. They appear to have capitulated to the outer London countryside lobby without even the hint of a fight and have condemned a whole generation of Londoners to a miserable housing future.

Khan promises to “protect the green belt, green spaces and play spaces, prioritising development on brown field sites”, and to “oppose building on the green belt, which is even more important today than it was when it was created.” Goldsmith talks about “protecting the green belt from development.” Continue reading →

I followed last week’s leaders’ summit from a distance via Twitter and a couple of subsequent blogs.

A few key messages seemed to be coming out of the day. We must do more to sell our message, we must engage with politicians, we must stop criticising each other, we must be optimistic and less negative, we need to tell the story of how the future can be better than the present. All good stuff but, in short, nothing that hasn’t been heard a thousand times before. Continue reading →