The centre piece of forthcoming [planning] bill is still very much in place. The idea is to gut the existing planning system and replace it with American-style “zoning”. Local authorities would be forced to divide up their communities between three types of zone: “protected”, “renewal” and “growth”. In the growth zones, outline planning permission would be granted automatically to qualifying developments and the rights of local people to object drastically curtailed.
It’s pure political poison. Every “growth zone” in the country would be seen as a building site in waiting — and every one of them surrounded by angry, disenfranchised residents. So all the ingredients are in place for a major backbench rebellion: dozens of anxious MPs; a choice of high profile potential leaders — including Theresa May and Jeremy Hunt; an opportunistic opposition; a pitifully weak Secretary of State (Robert Jenrick); and, worst of all, a truly terrible set of policies that deserve to be torn to shreds anyway.
William Hague has argued that planning reform could be Boris Johnson’s Poll Tax. It’s a lot worse than that. The Poll Tax was an unforced error. And once Margaret Thatcher was out of the way, it was easy to reverse ferret. On planning reform, however, Boris Johnson is in a much tighter spot.
An article that goes on to float an alternative approach:
The alternative approach being to pick on a few places and force them to become cities against their will, rather than spreading new building everywhere?
Its an interesting approach. Start with Chesham and Amersham pour encourager les autres?
I didn't realise it was based on American-style “zoning”.
Wow.
Anyone who has been to the US can tell you what a mess the outskirts of their cities are.
This is Johnson's poll tax. And so early in his administration. I guess he will just go off and make money when he is ousted as Cummings noted.
UK house prices £366 ($511) per sq ft US house prices $155 (£111) per sq ft
Hence part of the problem. The two electorally triumphant PMs of my lifetime are Thatcher and Blair. They each presided over a rough doubling of real-terms house prices; https://www.allagents.co.uk/house-prices-adjusted/
One one hand everyone knows, deep down, that those huge profits have come from somewhere. The absurd house prices in the UK distort the economy and create massive unfairness between the generations. But rising house prices wins elections.
The Unherd article linked to earlier is worth reading and had some good ideas. But it also misses the point in quite a revealing way. One of the solutions is to pass a law stopping speculators buying houses. That skims over the awkward reality that, if we have a mortgage we are the speculators. There have been too many years where I have made more by having a mortgage than being really good at my job.
And deflating that is going to need technical genius and a willingness to be unpopular.
No, I can't see it happening.
It's exactly this. Our housing market has turned a large portion of the population into investors. We react to any move to change this in the same way the markets respond to federal reserve threats to taper QE or raise interest rates. I am one of them - once you have your long term family home, it is 100% in your interest for house prices to rise for the rest of your life. So most people over, say, 35-40 have a vested interest for the remaining 40 years of their lives.
The only plausible solution to this if you're committed to do something about supply, is wage and general goods inflation, probably coupled with currency devaluation. Enables younger people to get on to the ladder, brings UK property more in line internationally, but continues to give house owners headline price rises and erosion of the real value of their mortgages while real terms housing values decline.
The issue isn’t rising house prices, it’s rising house prices as a multiple of average wages. That’s largely a factor of low interest rates and an inability of the government to use their commercial weight in housing benefit to push down rents
Its got absolutely nothing to do with low interest rates and is entirely to do with massive demand outstripping supply.
Increase supply and constrain demand and price ratios will fall down naturally. Though probably without a price collapse, since it will be gradual.
Banks are hugely focused on ability to repay. This is dependent on prevailing interest rates. If interest rates rise, affordability decreases, lending falls and prices fall.
Typically supply/demand results in a 10% swing around the base price.
But house price multiples which is what we're talking about peaked in 2007 when base rates were close to 6% not 0%.
Between 1997 and 2007 demand surged but construction didn't so house price ratios surged, despite interest rates being much higher then.
Between 2007 and 2019 interest rates collapsed to zero, demand continued to surge but construction increased and as a result house price ratios have basically remained roughly flat as demand and supply have kept in tandem.
If interest rates were the key factor, then house price ratios should have been much, much higher in 2019 than 2007. Especially considering our population increased a lot between 2007 and 2019 too, but construction eased the pressure so price ratios remained consistent, except especially in the one region were demand rose the most and supply rose the least.
Supply and demand works to explain the issues. Interest rates don't.
It’s about capital availability not interest rates directly. After 2008 capital was constrained, but it has since been released and multiples have returned to peak.
The rise from 1995 onwards was driven by recovery from the 89 crash and lower interest rates post ERM
Yes indeed. I forgot to mention the ease with which retail investors in the US can get leveraged stock accounts versus in the UK, where most people only get access to secured lending through residential property (or their car). And those with the data can refute or confirm, but the US probably has a deeper and broader options market available to retail investors as well.
On topic, I don't have a clue what's going on in Batley & Spen. But I do know that the Labour Party should be engaging in a full-blown, no-holds barred character assassination of Galloway. Some good material in Nick Palmer's earlier post, and there's lots more out there. They need to take the gloves off and distribute an abundance of material to raise serious doubts about Galloway's character and commitment to the constituency in voters' minds. It shouldn't be that hard.
Thanks Dr F for the HurstLama reference yesterday. I'm not on Twitter; can't, TBH, be bothered.
Cracking finish to the World Test Championship yesterday. And a good result against Sri Lanka.
What on earth was our Navy doing off the coast of Crimea yesterday? That war finished 165 years ago. And, looking at the BBC last night and the headline in the Mail, how many journalists were on the ship, and why?
"Maintaining the right of innocent passage" they are saying on the news this morning.
Bollocks.
Why? Nearly every country with a navy does that. Sweden regularly does so....
In the almost landlocked Black Sea?
Because we are essentially back in a cold war where any number of regimes - such as Putin's dictatorship - are trying to undermine international law.
I suppose we could ask Brussels to send one of the EU frigates to defend right of passage.
Oh wait - they haven't got any, and UVDL would be arguing with somebody about who got to direct it even after it had been sunk and the sailors killed by the Russians.
Back to topic, if those rather frighteningly short odds against Galloway coming second came true Labour would come closer to a difficult decision with no good outcomes:
Does it continue to go for the Islamic vote, knowing that to do so alienates it from many in the centre and even centre left
or
Does it veer away from that dependency, allowing the Tories to mop up Islamic votes from moderates and assimilators, and allowing Galloway and his lookalikes to form a religion based party founded on the mixed up left/Islamic flank both mopping up a few seats in Bethnal Green and Bradford and denying Labour a lot of votes.
What is odd is that a reputable poll recently showed Labour miles ahead of Galloway, while bookies/punters think this could easily be completely incorrect. How?
Thanks Dr F for the HurstLama reference yesterday. I'm not on Twitter; can't, TBH, be bothered.
Cracking finish to the World Test Championship yesterday. And a good result against Sri Lanka.
What on earth was our Navy doing off the coast of Crimea yesterday? That war finished 165 years ago. And, looking at the BBC last night and the headline in the Mail, how many journalists were on the ship, and why?
"Maintaining the right of innocent passage" they are saying on the news this morning.
Bollocks.
Why? Nearly every country with a navy does that. Sweden regularly does so....
As to Sweden sending ships to the Black sea specifically - I don't know. Some quite surprising countries have done the Bosphorus passage etc. to express their rights under international law.
The Swedish Navy does regular patrols etc to establish Swedish claims to various waters and the international status of other waters. Including areas contested with Russia....
Sweden famously used to send ships to the Black Sea
The centre piece of forthcoming [planning] bill is still very much in place. The idea is to gut the existing planning system and replace it with American-style “zoning”. Local authorities would be forced to divide up their communities between three types of zone: “protected”, “renewal” and “growth”. In the growth zones, outline planning permission would be granted automatically to qualifying developments and the rights of local people to object drastically curtailed.
It’s pure political poison. Every “growth zone” in the country would be seen as a building site in waiting — and every one of them surrounded by angry, disenfranchised residents. So all the ingredients are in place for a major backbench rebellion: dozens of anxious MPs; a choice of high profile potential leaders — including Theresa May and Jeremy Hunt; an opportunistic opposition; a pitifully weak Secretary of State (Robert Jenrick); and, worst of all, a truly terrible set of policies that deserve to be torn to shreds anyway.
William Hague has argued that planning reform could be Boris Johnson’s Poll Tax. It’s a lot worse than that. The Poll Tax was an unforced error. And once Margaret Thatcher was out of the way, it was easy to reverse ferret. On planning reform, however, Boris Johnson is in a much tighter spot.
An article that goes on to float an alternative approach:
The alternative approach being to pick on a few places and force them to become cities against their will, rather than spreading new building everywhere?
Its an interesting approach. Start with Chesham and Amersham pour encourager les autres?
I didn't realise it was based on American-style “zoning”.
Wow.
Anyone who has been to the US can tell you what a mess the outskirts of their cities are.
This is Johnson's poll tax. And so early in his administration. I guess he will just go off and make money when he is ousted as Cummings noted.
UK house prices £366 ($511) per sq ft US house prices $155 (£111) per sq ft
So de Pfeffel wants to collapse house prices. Very brave.
Do you think high house prices are a good thing?
An increase in supply won't itself lead to a collapse in house prices, I wouldn't have thought, because it will happen gradually. All other things being equal (which they won't be), an increase in supply would lead to a gradual real terms reduction in house prices. Which would be a good thing.
I think we can generally agree that high house prices are bad but that house price collapses are bad. The only solution I see to this is gradual real terms reductions.
The key issue is, as touched on in that article, the proposed changes won't do much to bring house prices down or even slow their increase by much. It'll just piss off everyone affected, while enriching a handful of big developers (who will be the ones in full control over the supply and therefore in control over house prices).
One problem is the Politician's Syllogism: "Something must be done. This is something. It therefore must be done."
The suggestion in the article: "Planning reform, therefore, is largely irrelevant. A very different plan of action is required.
Firstly, the law should be used to exclude speculators from the housing market. We plan the location of new housing for environmental reasons and we should plan the ownership of new housing for social reasons. Most new houses should be reserved for first-time buyers and movers.
Free marketers might complain that this is distributism not capitalism. But so what? For a conservative, spreading home ownership should come before the purity of the market place.
On the supply side, government needs to break the big developers’ stranglehold on the land supply. It can do this by purchasing and preparing sites itself. A time-limited right to fully develop and sell-on plots could then be auctioned-off. Builders would thus be able to obtain the sites they need for houses they actually intend to build, but they’d have no need — nor the perverse incentive — to hold on to more land than that. "
... is key. And the planning reforms proposed won't do that. If anything, they'll move us further away from that. So we end up with no bringing down of house prices, poorly built rabbit hutches, big developers controlling the supply of housing, and really pissed off locals everywhere who are being completely ignored (get them involved and the problem really does reduce) and rapidly transition from dubious through NIMBY to BANANA.
Developers do not control the supply of land. They are usually just a convenient target who do not have votes.
That is done by local councils through the local plan development and zoning process. Landowners bring forward proposed sites (of which there are always more than needed), and teh Council rate them by their chosen criteria, make an ordered list and go down the list until their Housing Needs Assessment (which they also control) target has been met.
If the Council want more development land, they can allocate it.
The rub is that they often (as we have seen in C&A) do not want to do that, because their voters are self-serving Nimbys.
The article is weird - ill-informed, superficial, full of holes and impractical. I get the impression that he has never built anything other than with Lego.
On the proposal - why should the *Government* be the one buying plots. I thought the key objection was that the new proposal would take control AWAY from local communities. Give that power to the Local Authority, if someone must have it.
But it won't help, because it does not address the heart of the issue.
Nope. Once a developer has a site approved, they have control over it. One of our sites: thousands of houses, planning permission going through. Developer states "we will build out over 25 years". I ask: "why so long?" Them: "Market conditions." [ie: we don't want to build out rapidly enough to bring prices down]
Should the reforms go through and big developers can just roll up with auto-approval on all large sites, they get the planning permission, it's their site, they build out at the speed they like. The speed they like is the one that keeps cashflow coming in as long as possible without putting prices down.
They're fully aware of market forces; they aren't idiots. It's perfectly rational from their side.
(NB: Local Authorities don't control the number of houses they are deemed to need. They get to discuss and argue it, but that's imposed on them)
In The Blue Book of the War (written 1916, I think, reprinted 1917) there was a rather unexpected chapter on British submarine shenanigans going on in that area.
The centre piece of forthcoming [planning] bill is still very much in place. The idea is to gut the existing planning system and replace it with American-style “zoning”. Local authorities would be forced to divide up their communities between three types of zone: “protected”, “renewal” and “growth”. In the growth zones, outline planning permission would be granted automatically to qualifying developments and the rights of local people to object drastically curtailed.
It’s pure political poison. Every “growth zone” in the country would be seen as a building site in waiting — and every one of them surrounded by angry, disenfranchised residents. So all the ingredients are in place for a major backbench rebellion: dozens of anxious MPs; a choice of high profile potential leaders — including Theresa May and Jeremy Hunt; an opportunistic opposition; a pitifully weak Secretary of State (Robert Jenrick); and, worst of all, a truly terrible set of policies that deserve to be torn to shreds anyway.
William Hague has argued that planning reform could be Boris Johnson’s Poll Tax. It’s a lot worse than that. The Poll Tax was an unforced error. And once Margaret Thatcher was out of the way, it was easy to reverse ferret. On planning reform, however, Boris Johnson is in a much tighter spot.
An article that goes on to float an alternative approach:
The alternative approach being to pick on a few places and force them to become cities against their will, rather than spreading new building everywhere?
Its an interesting approach. Start with Chesham and Amersham pour encourager les autres?
I didn't realise it was based on American-style “zoning”.
Wow.
Anyone who has been to the US can tell you what a mess the outskirts of their cities are.
This is Johnson's poll tax. And so early in his administration. I guess he will just go off and make money when he is ousted as Cummings noted.
UK house prices £366 ($511) per sq ft US house prices $155 (£111) per sq ft
So de Pfeffel wants to collapse house prices. Very brave.
Do you think high house prices are a good thing?
An increase in supply won't itself lead to a collapse in house prices, I wouldn't have thought, because it will happen gradually. All other things being equal (which they won't be), an increase in supply would lead to a gradual real terms reduction in house prices. Which would be a good thing.
I think we can generally agree that high house prices are bad but that house price collapses are bad. The only solution I see to this is gradual real terms reductions.
The key issue is, as touched on in that article, the proposed changes won't do much to bring house prices down or even slow their increase by much. It'll just piss off everyone affected, while enriching a handful of big developers (who will be the ones in full control over the supply and therefore in control over house prices).
One problem is the Politician's Syllogism: "Something must be done. This is something. It therefore must be done."
The suggestion in the article: "Planning reform, therefore, is largely irrelevant. A very different plan of action is required.
Firstly, the law should be used to exclude speculators from the housing market. We plan the location of new housing for environmental reasons and we should plan the ownership of new housing for social reasons. Most new houses should be reserved for first-time buyers and movers.
Free marketers might complain that this is distributism not capitalism. But so what? For a conservative, spreading home ownership should come before the purity of the market place.
On the supply side, government needs to break the big developers’ stranglehold on the land supply. It can do this by purchasing and preparing sites itself. A time-limited right to fully develop and sell-on plots could then be auctioned-off. Builders would thus be able to obtain the sites they need for houses they actually intend to build, but they’d have no need — nor the perverse incentive — to hold on to more land than that. "
... is key. And the planning reforms proposed won't do that. If anything, they'll move us further away from that. So we end up with no bringing down of house prices, poorly built rabbit hutches, big developers controlling the supply of housing, and really pissed off locals everywhere who are being completely ignored (get them involved and the problem really does reduce) and rapidly transition from dubious through NIMBY to BANANA.
Developers do not control the supply of land. They are usually just a convenient target who do not have votes.
That is done by local councils through the local plan development and zoning process. Landowners bring forward proposed sites (of which there are always more than needed), and teh Council rate them by their chosen criteria, make an ordered list and go down the list until their Housing Needs Assessment (which they also control) target has been met.
If the Council want more development land, they can allocate it.
The rub is that they often (as we have seen in C&A) do not want to do that, because their voters are self-serving Nimbys.
The article is weird - ill-informed, superficial, full of holes and impractical. I get the impression that he has never built anything other than with Lego.
On the proposal - why should the *Government* be the one buying plots. I thought the key objection was that the new proposal would take control AWAY from local communities. Give that power to the Local Authority, if someone must have it.
But it won't help, because it does not address the heart of the issue.
Developers do, however, have a huge interest in maintaining a tight grip on the supply of new houses in order to maximise their income. Most of the cost of a house is not in the house itself (in most parts of the coutry) but in the value of the land with planning permission underneath it.
My personal prediction is that local councils being forced to permit building will do little to nothing to promote house-building at the scale we need, because house builders don’t want to build at that rate - it lowers achievable prices whilst simultaneously driving up input costs (especially the labour cost of chippies, sparks etc etc).
In a free market developers can't refuse to build because if they do someone else will do the building instead and that someone else will make the profit instead.
The only way developers can refuse to build is if they have monopolistic powers, which doesn't happen in a free market because there's relatively low entry costs to this sector. The developers being the only ones who can navigate the planning system is what gives them monopolistic powers and why that doesn't exist in other nations with zonal planning where smaller developers or even self-building can exist instead.
As soon as they get the planning permission, there is no more free market. You can't roll up and build on a development site they've already got planning permission for. Even if they're building out really slowly.
Back to topic, if those rather frighteningly short odds against Galloway coming second came true Labour would come closer to a difficult decision with no good outcomes:
Does it continue to go for the Islamic vote, knowing that to do so alienates it from many in the centre and even centre left
or
Does it veer away from that dependency, allowing the Tories to mop up Islamic votes from moderates and assimilators, and allowing Galloway and his lookalikes to form a religion based party founded on the mixed up left/Islamic flank both mopping up a few seats in Bethnal Green and Bradford and denying Labour a lot of votes.
What odd is that a reputable poll recently showed Labour miles ahead of Galloway, while bookies/punters think this could easily be completely incorrect. How?
On Betfair at least the market is really thin, with ample scope for politically-motivated mischief - with £100 you can shift the main odds substantially either way. The Conservatives have an interest in talking up Galloway to split the Labour vote and are doing so - I wouldn't be a bit surprised if they've also thrown a few hundred into Betfair. In addition, the lure of getting long odds on an outsider always tempts people.
This doesn't mean that he's not making vast strides not seen by the poll last week, but it's a reason for caution in letting the state of the market decide your own position.
The centre piece of forthcoming [planning] bill is still very much in place. The idea is to gut the existing planning system and replace it with American-style “zoning”. Local authorities would be forced to divide up their communities between three types of zone: “protected”, “renewal” and “growth”. In the growth zones, outline planning permission would be granted automatically to qualifying developments and the rights of local people to object drastically curtailed.
It’s pure political poison. Every “growth zone” in the country would be seen as a building site in waiting — and every one of them surrounded by angry, disenfranchised residents. So all the ingredients are in place for a major backbench rebellion: dozens of anxious MPs; a choice of high profile potential leaders — including Theresa May and Jeremy Hunt; an opportunistic opposition; a pitifully weak Secretary of State (Robert Jenrick); and, worst of all, a truly terrible set of policies that deserve to be torn to shreds anyway.
William Hague has argued that planning reform could be Boris Johnson’s Poll Tax. It’s a lot worse than that. The Poll Tax was an unforced error. And once Margaret Thatcher was out of the way, it was easy to reverse ferret. On planning reform, however, Boris Johnson is in a much tighter spot.
An article that goes on to float an alternative approach:
The alternative approach being to pick on a few places and force them to become cities against their will, rather than spreading new building everywhere?
Its an interesting approach. Start with Chesham and Amersham pour encourager les autres?
I didn't realise it was based on American-style “zoning”.
Wow.
Anyone who has been to the US can tell you what a mess the outskirts of their cities are.
This is Johnson's poll tax. And so early in his administration. I guess he will just go off and make money when he is ousted as Cummings noted.
UK house prices £366 ($511) per sq ft US house prices $155 (£111) per sq ft
So de Pfeffel wants to collapse house prices. Very brave.
Do you think high house prices are a good thing?
An increase in supply won't itself lead to a collapse in house prices, I wouldn't have thought, because it will happen gradually. All other things being equal (which they won't be), an increase in supply would lead to a gradual real terms reduction in house prices. Which would be a good thing.
I think we can generally agree that high house prices are bad but that house price collapses are bad. The only solution I see to this is gradual real terms reductions.
The key issue is, as touched on in that article, the proposed changes won't do much to bring house prices down or even slow their increase by much. It'll just piss off everyone affected, while enriching a handful of big developers (who will be the ones in full control over the supply and therefore in control over house prices).
One problem is the Politician's Syllogism: "Something must be done. This is something. It therefore must be done."
The suggestion in the article: "Planning reform, therefore, is largely irrelevant. A very different plan of action is required.
Firstly, the law should be used to exclude speculators from the housing market. We plan the location of new housing for environmental reasons and we should plan the ownership of new housing for social reasons. Most new houses should be reserved for first-time buyers and movers.
Free marketers might complain that this is distributism not capitalism. But so what? For a conservative, spreading home ownership should come before the purity of the market place.
On the supply side, government needs to break the big developers’ stranglehold on the land supply. It can do this by purchasing and preparing sites itself. A time-limited right to fully develop and sell-on plots could then be auctioned-off. Builders would thus be able to obtain the sites they need for houses they actually intend to build, but they’d have no need — nor the perverse incentive — to hold on to more land than that. "
... is key. And the planning reforms proposed won't do that. If anything, they'll move us further away from that. So we end up with no bringing down of house prices, poorly built rabbit hutches, big developers controlling the supply of housing, and really pissed off locals everywhere who are being completely ignored (get them involved and the problem really does reduce) and rapidly transition from dubious through NIMBY to BANANA.
Developers do not control the supply of land. They are usually just a convenient target who do not have votes.
That is done by local councils through the local plan development and zoning process. Landowners bring forward proposed sites (of which there are always more than needed), and teh Council rate them by their chosen criteria, make an ordered list and go down the list until their Housing Needs Assessment (which they also control) target has been met.
If the Council want more development land, they can allocate it.
The rub is that they often (as we have seen in C&A) do not want to do that, because their voters are self-serving Nimbys.
The article is weird - ill-informed, superficial, full of holes and impractical. I get the impression that he has never built anything other than with Lego.
On the proposal - why should the *Government* be the one buying plots. I thought the key objection was that the new proposal would take control AWAY from local communities. Give that power to the Local Authority, if someone must have it.
But it won't help, because it does not address the heart of the issue.
Developers do, however, have a huge interest in maintaining a tight grip on the supply of new houses in order to maximise their income. Most of the cost of a house is not in the house itself (in most parts of the coutry) but in the value of the land with planning permission underneath it.
My personal prediction is that local councils being forced to permit building will do little to nothing to promote house-building at the scale we need, because house builders don’t want to build at that rate - it lowers achievable prices whilst simultaneously driving up input costs (especially the labour cost of chippies, sparks etc etc).
There is nothing to stop Councils releasing more land, or giving more Planning Permissions.
Developers will sell into the market, and there is a limit to how fast things sell - that is a dynamic of society not controlled by developers. London may be different in that respect due to people travelling past half a million houses to get to work - that is not how it works elsewhere. Talk to a normal sales office about a normal estate in a normal town and you will find that locals (within 10-15 miles) buy 80-90% of newbuild houses.
They will not build thousands and thousands of houses that will not sell yet because they remember what happened in 2009-2012, and as soon as you try to force the process into your favoured form that forces extra costs and reduces viability (which nobbles Planning Gain possible taxes), or raises prices.
In The Blue Book of the War (written 1916, I think, reprinted 1917) there was a rather unexpected chapter on British submarine shenanigans going on in that area.
I read a book on the history of submarine warfare (possibly available on youtube as an audio book....) which covered those actions - very interesting
The centre piece of forthcoming [planning] bill is still very much in place. The idea is to gut the existing planning system and replace it with American-style “zoning”. Local authorities would be forced to divide up their communities between three types of zone: “protected”, “renewal” and “growth”. In the growth zones, outline planning permission would be granted automatically to qualifying developments and the rights of local people to object drastically curtailed.
It’s pure political poison. Every “growth zone” in the country would be seen as a building site in waiting — and every one of them surrounded by angry, disenfranchised residents. So all the ingredients are in place for a major backbench rebellion: dozens of anxious MPs; a choice of high profile potential leaders — including Theresa May and Jeremy Hunt; an opportunistic opposition; a pitifully weak Secretary of State (Robert Jenrick); and, worst of all, a truly terrible set of policies that deserve to be torn to shreds anyway.
William Hague has argued that planning reform could be Boris Johnson’s Poll Tax. It’s a lot worse than that. The Poll Tax was an unforced error. And once Margaret Thatcher was out of the way, it was easy to reverse ferret. On planning reform, however, Boris Johnson is in a much tighter spot.
An article that goes on to float an alternative approach:
The alternative approach being to pick on a few places and force them to become cities against their will, rather than spreading new building everywhere?
Its an interesting approach. Start with Chesham and Amersham pour encourager les autres?
I didn't realise it was based on American-style “zoning”.
Wow.
Anyone who has been to the US can tell you what a mess the outskirts of their cities are.
This is Johnson's poll tax. And so early in his administration. I guess he will just go off and make money when he is ousted as Cummings noted.
UK house prices £366 ($511) per sq ft US house prices $155 (£111) per sq ft
So de Pfeffel wants to collapse house prices. Very brave.
Do you think high house prices are a good thing?
An increase in supply won't itself lead to a collapse in house prices, I wouldn't have thought, because it will happen gradually. All other things being equal (which they won't be), an increase in supply would lead to a gradual real terms reduction in house prices. Which would be a good thing.
I think we can generally agree that high house prices are bad but that house price collapses are bad. The only solution I see to this is gradual real terms reductions.
The key issue is, as touched on in that article, the proposed changes won't do much to bring house prices down or even slow their increase by much. It'll just piss off everyone affected, while enriching a handful of big developers (who will be the ones in full control over the supply and therefore in control over house prices).
One problem is the Politician's Syllogism: "Something must be done. This is something. It therefore must be done."
The suggestion in the article: "Planning reform, therefore, is largely irrelevant. A very different plan of action is required.
Firstly, the law should be used to exclude speculators from the housing market. We plan the location of new housing for environmental reasons and we should plan the ownership of new housing for social reasons. Most new houses should be reserved for first-time buyers and movers.
Free marketers might complain that this is distributism not capitalism. But so what? For a conservative, spreading home ownership should come before the purity of the market place.
On the supply side, government needs to break the big developers’ stranglehold on the land supply. It can do this by purchasing and preparing sites itself. A time-limited right to fully develop and sell-on plots could then be auctioned-off. Builders would thus be able to obtain the sites they need for houses they actually intend to build, but they’d have no need — nor the perverse incentive — to hold on to more land than that. "
... is key. And the planning reforms proposed won't do that. If anything, they'll move us further away from that. So we end up with no bringing down of house prices, poorly built rabbit hutches, big developers controlling the supply of housing, and really pissed off locals everywhere who are being completely ignored (get them involved and the problem really does reduce) and rapidly transition from dubious through NIMBY to BANANA.
Developers do not control the supply of land. They are usually just a convenient target who do not have votes.
That is done by local councils through the local plan development and zoning process. Landowners bring forward proposed sites (of which there are always more than needed), and teh Council rate them by their chosen criteria, make an ordered list and go down the list until their Housing Needs Assessment (which they also control) target has been met.
If the Council want more development land, they can allocate it.
The rub is that they often (as we have seen in C&A) do not want to do that, because their voters are self-serving Nimbys.
The article is weird - ill-informed, superficial, full of holes and impractical. I get the impression that he has never built anything other than with Lego.
On the proposal - why should the *Government* be the one buying plots. I thought the key objection was that the new proposal would take control AWAY from local communities. Give that power to the Local Authority, if someone must have it.
But it won't help, because it does not address the heart of the issue.
Nope. Once a developer has a site approved, they have control over it. One of our sites: thousands of houses, planning permission going through. Developer states "we will build out over 25 years". I ask: "why so long?" Them: "Market conditions." [ie: we don't want to build out rapidly enough to bring prices down]
Should the reforms go through and big developers can just roll up with auto-approval on all large sites, they get the planning permission, it's their site, they build out at the speed they like. The speed they like is the one that keeps cashflow coming in as long as possible without putting prices down.
They're fully aware of market forces; they aren't idiots. It's perfectly rational from their side.
(NB: Local Authorities don't control the number of houses they are deemed to need. They get to discuss and argue it, but that's imposed on them)
However it is imposed because they want to keep the number low, surely.
Are you aware of any Government which has said "that's too many"?
On topic, I don't have a clue what's going on in Batley & Spen. But I do know that the Labour Party should be engaging in a full-blown, no-holds barred character assassination of Galloway. Some good material in Nick Palmer's earlier post, and there's lots more out there. They need to take the gloves off and distribute an abundance of material to raise serious doubts about Galloway's character and commitment to the constituency in voters' minds. It shouldn't be that hard.
A "no-holds barred character assassination of Galloway" is what he wants.
If you fight dirty, then Galloway can certainly fight dirtier. And enjoy it.
The centre piece of forthcoming [planning] bill is still very much in place. The idea is to gut the existing planning system and replace it with American-style “zoning”. Local authorities would be forced to divide up their communities between three types of zone: “protected”, “renewal” and “growth”. In the growth zones, outline planning permission would be granted automatically to qualifying developments and the rights of local people to object drastically curtailed.
It’s pure political poison. Every “growth zone” in the country would be seen as a building site in waiting — and every one of them surrounded by angry, disenfranchised residents. So all the ingredients are in place for a major backbench rebellion: dozens of anxious MPs; a choice of high profile potential leaders — including Theresa May and Jeremy Hunt; an opportunistic opposition; a pitifully weak Secretary of State (Robert Jenrick); and, worst of all, a truly terrible set of policies that deserve to be torn to shreds anyway.
William Hague has argued that planning reform could be Boris Johnson’s Poll Tax. It’s a lot worse than that. The Poll Tax was an unforced error. And once Margaret Thatcher was out of the way, it was easy to reverse ferret. On planning reform, however, Boris Johnson is in a much tighter spot.
An article that goes on to float an alternative approach:
The alternative approach being to pick on a few places and force them to become cities against their will, rather than spreading new building everywhere?
Its an interesting approach. Start with Chesham and Amersham pour encourager les autres?
I didn't realise it was based on American-style “zoning”.
Wow.
Anyone who has been to the US can tell you what a mess the outskirts of their cities are.
This is Johnson's poll tax. And so early in his administration. I guess he will just go off and make money when he is ousted as Cummings noted.
UK house prices £366 ($511) per sq ft US house prices $155 (£111) per sq ft
So de Pfeffel wants to collapse house prices. Very brave.
Do you think high house prices are a good thing?
An increase in supply won't itself lead to a collapse in house prices, I wouldn't have thought, because it will happen gradually. All other things being equal (which they won't be), an increase in supply would lead to a gradual real terms reduction in house prices. Which would be a good thing.
I think we can generally agree that high house prices are bad but that house price collapses are bad. The only solution I see to this is gradual real terms reductions.
Unless we built houses on the scale of an emergency program to build prefabs in factories, trucked to site and put up at a rate of 100s per day (think https://www.huf-haus.com/en-uk/ multiplied by the Manhattan Project), it won't be possible for supply to exceed demand.
The most you can do is slow the rate of increase in prices. With a truly heroic effort, you might get house prices to slow their increase below the rate of increase in wages....
Pretty easy, I'd have thought. End buy-to-let. It would not increase the number of houses available but would reduce prices, initially by forcing a fire sale and later by ending price competition from would-be private landlords using BTL as an alternative to pensions or savings because interest rates are so low.
Er no. All that does is contact the rental sector, moving the stock to the purchase sector. Then rents rise....
The problem is that there are not enough properties compared to the demand for them. The options are
- reduce the number of people - increase the number of properties - both
We have more housing stock, and more rooms per person, than ever before. The problem is one of distribution rather than supply.
There is too much money in the housing market from investors in buy-to-let and this does drive up prices. We need the economy to create better investment opportunities elsewhere.
We also have the boomer generation hanging on to their large family homes, while their children are squeezed into smaller properties with their families.
We could build more properties to solve that problem, I guess, or we could find ways to encourage people to downsize, or otherwise use the housing stock more efficiently.
It means bigger houses, or bigger gardens, either way is a win.
No, this is bonkers. Both mean eating up available space with houses that are unaffordable for most people, thus making the crisis worse. The effect would be (a) more and more people unable to buy or rent homes or (b) more and more land area built on, i.e. urban sprawl on speed. High density (with the safeguards discussed elsewhere on the thread) is essential to any successful housing strategy, whether you want more owner-occupancy, more rented accommodation or both.
Mixed bag of local byelections today -Chichester (Lab defence), Gwynedd (Ind), North Lanarkshire (Ind), Rugby ( Con), Somerset West and Taunton (LD), Swindon (Ind elected as Con).
On topic, I don't have a clue what's going on in Batley & Spen. But I do know that the Labour Party should be engaging in a full-blown, no-holds barred character assassination of Galloway. Some good material in Nick Palmer's earlier post, and there's lots more out there. They need to take the gloves off and distribute an abundance of material to raise serious doubts about Galloway's character and commitment to the constituency in voters' minds. It shouldn't be that hard.
Sure, but this means engaging in a war on two fronts (Galloway & the Tories) whereas the Heavy Woollens aren't running this time. Just makes it very hard for Labour.
The centre piece of forthcoming [planning] bill is still very much in place. The idea is to gut the existing planning system and replace it with American-style “zoning”. Local authorities would be forced to divide up their communities between three types of zone: “protected”, “renewal” and “growth”. In the growth zones, outline planning permission would be granted automatically to qualifying developments and the rights of local people to object drastically curtailed.
It’s pure political poison. Every “growth zone” in the country would be seen as a building site in waiting — and every one of them surrounded by angry, disenfranchised residents. So all the ingredients are in place for a major backbench rebellion: dozens of anxious MPs; a choice of high profile potential leaders — including Theresa May and Jeremy Hunt; an opportunistic opposition; a pitifully weak Secretary of State (Robert Jenrick); and, worst of all, a truly terrible set of policies that deserve to be torn to shreds anyway.
William Hague has argued that planning reform could be Boris Johnson’s Poll Tax. It’s a lot worse than that. The Poll Tax was an unforced error. And once Margaret Thatcher was out of the way, it was easy to reverse ferret. On planning reform, however, Boris Johnson is in a much tighter spot.
An article that goes on to float an alternative approach:
The alternative approach being to pick on a few places and force them to become cities against their will, rather than spreading new building everywhere?
Its an interesting approach. Start with Chesham and Amersham pour encourager les autres?
I didn't realise it was based on American-style “zoning”.
Wow.
Anyone who has been to the US can tell you what a mess the outskirts of their cities are.
This is Johnson's poll tax. And so early in his administration. I guess he will just go off and make money when he is ousted as Cummings noted.
UK house prices £366 ($511) per sq ft US house prices $155 (£111) per sq ft
So de Pfeffel wants to collapse house prices. Very brave.
Do you think high house prices are a good thing?
An increase in supply won't itself lead to a collapse in house prices, I wouldn't have thought, because it will happen gradually. All other things being equal (which they won't be), an increase in supply would lead to a gradual real terms reduction in house prices. Which would be a good thing.
I think we can generally agree that high house prices are bad but that house price collapses are bad. The only solution I see to this is gradual real terms reductions.
The key issue is, as touched on in that article, the proposed changes won't do much to bring house prices down or even slow their increase by much. It'll just piss off everyone affected, while enriching a handful of big developers (who will be the ones in full control over the supply and therefore in control over house prices).
One problem is the Politician's Syllogism: "Something must be done. This is something. It therefore must be done."
The suggestion in the article: "Planning reform, therefore, is largely irrelevant. A very different plan of action is required.
Firstly, the law should be used to exclude speculators from the housing market. We plan the location of new housing for environmental reasons and we should plan the ownership of new housing for social reasons. Most new houses should be reserved for first-time buyers and movers.
Free marketers might complain that this is distributism not capitalism. But so what? For a conservative, spreading home ownership should come before the purity of the market place.
On the supply side, government needs to break the big developers’ stranglehold on the land supply. It can do this by purchasing and preparing sites itself. A time-limited right to fully develop and sell-on plots could then be auctioned-off. Builders would thus be able to obtain the sites they need for houses they actually intend to build, but they’d have no need — nor the perverse incentive — to hold on to more land than that. "
... is key. And the planning reforms proposed won't do that. If anything, they'll move us further away from that. So we end up with no bringing down of house prices, poorly built rabbit hutches, big developers controlling the supply of housing, and really pissed off locals everywhere who are being completely ignored (get them involved and the problem really does reduce) and rapidly transition from dubious through NIMBY to BANANA.
Developers do not control the supply of land. They are usually just a convenient target who do not have votes.
That is done by local councils through the local plan development and zoning process. Landowners bring forward proposed sites (of which there are always more than needed), and teh Council rate them by their chosen criteria, make an ordered list and go down the list until their Housing Needs Assessment (which they also control) target has been met.
If the Council want more development land, they can allocate it.
The rub is that they often (as we have seen in C&A) do not want to do that, because their voters are self-serving Nimbys.
The article is weird - ill-informed, superficial, full of holes and impractical. I get the impression that he has never built anything other than with Lego.
On the proposal - why should the *Government* be the one buying plots. I thought the key objection was that the new proposal would take control AWAY from local communities. Give that power to the Local Authority, if someone must have it.
But it won't help, because it does not address the heart of the issue.
Nope. Once a developer has a site approved, they have control over it. One of our sites: thousands of houses, planning permission going through. Developer states "we will build out over 25 years". I ask: "why so long?" Them: "Market conditions." [ie: we don't want to build out rapidly enough to bring prices down]
Should the reforms go through and big developers can just roll up with auto-approval on all large sites, they get the planning permission, it's their site, they build out at the speed they like. The speed they like is the one that keeps cashflow coming in as long as possible without putting prices down.
They're fully aware of market forces; they aren't idiots. It's perfectly rational from their side.
(NB: Local Authorities don't control the number of houses they are deemed to need. They get to discuss and argue it, but that's imposed on them)
It's also worth remembering that big property companies are terrible about implementing the infrastructure they promise local communities when developing new sites. On the estate I live on the property company took the better part of 5 years to build a bridge across a railway line into town. The estate was effectively cut off if you didn't drive or fancied a really long walk. Reducing the ability of local councils to exert control is just going to give them even less insensitive to fulfill their community promises.
And we'll be only let out for the mass application of leeches. So we need to know how to manage these events, OK. I'm really glad that they're doing the necessary planning now.
I see a sudden business opportunity in leech farming. If only I had a cabinet minister on speed dial to bung me the necessary start up cash...
Very good people with whom to do business, in my experience. Once sent a box up from S.Wales to Essex by motorcycle courier in significantly under 3 hours.
I'm re-watching Michael Palin's v enjoyable New Europe on Saturday evenings. He went to a leech doctor in Estonia; western liberal softie that I am I recoiled somewhat when the 'hirudotherapist' (as I learned I must call them) dispatched the leeches in caustic soda immediately afterwards!
Hard cheese on them, but when they contain fresh blood ...
A colleague (who is an active zoologist in his spare time) was very taken at having leeches applied to reduce the swelling caused by bleeding/bruising around his eye socket. I imagine he was one chap who didn't need as much persuasion as other patients.
Edit: this was in/near Edinburgh. Cutting edge innovation these days - wheel full circle and all that.
In The Blue Book of the War (written 1916, I think, reprinted 1917) there was a rather unexpected chapter on British submarine shenanigans going on in that area.
I read a book on the history of submarine warfare (possibly available on youtube as an audio book....) which covered those actions - very interesting
Yes - some of the characters involved were British Lunatic (standard issue).
Nasmith swimming out to an expended torpedo, from his submarine, to disarm it and then reload it for another go.....
The centre piece of forthcoming [planning] bill is still very much in place. The idea is to gut the existing planning system and replace it with American-style “zoning”. Local authorities would be forced to divide up their communities between three types of zone: “protected”, “renewal” and “growth”. In the growth zones, outline planning permission would be granted automatically to qualifying developments and the rights of local people to object drastically curtailed.
It’s pure political poison. Every “growth zone” in the country would be seen as a building site in waiting — and every one of them surrounded by angry, disenfranchised residents. So all the ingredients are in place for a major backbench rebellion: dozens of anxious MPs; a choice of high profile potential leaders — including Theresa May and Jeremy Hunt; an opportunistic opposition; a pitifully weak Secretary of State (Robert Jenrick); and, worst of all, a truly terrible set of policies that deserve to be torn to shreds anyway.
William Hague has argued that planning reform could be Boris Johnson’s Poll Tax. It’s a lot worse than that. The Poll Tax was an unforced error. And once Margaret Thatcher was out of the way, it was easy to reverse ferret. On planning reform, however, Boris Johnson is in a much tighter spot.
An article that goes on to float an alternative approach:
The alternative approach being to pick on a few places and force them to become cities against their will, rather than spreading new building everywhere?
Its an interesting approach. Start with Chesham and Amersham pour encourager les autres?
I didn't realise it was based on American-style “zoning”.
Wow.
Anyone who has been to the US can tell you what a mess the outskirts of their cities are.
This is Johnson's poll tax. And so early in his administration. I guess he will just go off and make money when he is ousted as Cummings noted.
Yep - basically once your area is designated for growth, it'd be a free for all. Driving a coach and horses through our existing planning system.
Jenrick is finished. Someone will have to take the blame when the screeching u-turn is implemented.
If Jenrick is finished and there is a screeching u-turn on doing the right thing then that will be the biggest domestic mistake since Tony Blair told Frank Field to think the unthinkable, then sacked him for thinking the unthinkable.
My favourite political joke of the modern era was William Hague's "They told him to think the unthinkable. So he thought it. And they said 'that's unthinkable!'"
Hague was much funnier than Johnson and yet the latter is known for his humour.
Johnson's humour is more a form of performance art; a fully rounded comic persona. Fewer actual jokes - his humour is more in 'saying the sorts of things Boris Johnson would say'.
Stewart Lee tells a lot cleverer jokes than Peter Kay, but Peter Kay has made 100x what Stewart Lee has out of comedy....
When he does stand-up, Peter Kay's jokes aren't actually that funny. Quite jolly observational humour, but nothing you haven't really heard before. But there's more to being a comedian than telling jokes. There's the whole performance. You are laughing at Peter Kay before he's opened his mouth. I would argue that he is a genius. His sitcoms etc are a different kettle of fish - these genuinely are clever. But in all honesty I find his stand-up funnier.
I had no idea I had such strong opinions about comedy.
Do we know what is happening with Peter Kay now? He looked far from 100% as at his last TV appearance...
The centre piece of forthcoming [planning] bill is still very much in place. The idea is to gut the existing planning system and replace it with American-style “zoning”. Local authorities would be forced to divide up their communities between three types of zone: “protected”, “renewal” and “growth”. In the growth zones, outline planning permission would be granted automatically to qualifying developments and the rights of local people to object drastically curtailed.
It’s pure political poison. Every “growth zone” in the country would be seen as a building site in waiting — and every one of them surrounded by angry, disenfranchised residents. So all the ingredients are in place for a major backbench rebellion: dozens of anxious MPs; a choice of high profile potential leaders — including Theresa May and Jeremy Hunt; an opportunistic opposition; a pitifully weak Secretary of State (Robert Jenrick); and, worst of all, a truly terrible set of policies that deserve to be torn to shreds anyway.
William Hague has argued that planning reform could be Boris Johnson’s Poll Tax. It’s a lot worse than that. The Poll Tax was an unforced error. And once Margaret Thatcher was out of the way, it was easy to reverse ferret. On planning reform, however, Boris Johnson is in a much tighter spot.
An article that goes on to float an alternative approach:
The alternative approach being to pick on a few places and force them to become cities against their will, rather than spreading new building everywhere?
Its an interesting approach. Start with Chesham and Amersham pour encourager les autres?
I didn't realise it was based on American-style “zoning”.
Wow.
Anyone who has been to the US can tell you what a mess the outskirts of their cities are.
This is Johnson's poll tax. And so early in his administration. I guess he will just go off and make money when he is ousted as Cummings noted.
UK house prices £366 ($511) per sq ft US house prices $155 (£111) per sq ft
So de Pfeffel wants to collapse house prices. Very brave.
Do you think high house prices are a good thing?
An increase in supply won't itself lead to a collapse in house prices, I wouldn't have thought, because it will happen gradually. All other things being equal (which they won't be), an increase in supply would lead to a gradual real terms reduction in house prices. Which would be a good thing.
I think we can generally agree that high house prices are bad but that house price collapses are bad. The only solution I see to this is gradual real terms reductions.
Unless we built houses on the scale of an emergency program to build prefabs in factories, trucked to site and put up at a rate of 100s per day (think https://www.huf-haus.com/en-uk/ multiplied by the Manhattan Project), it won't be possible for supply to exceed demand.
The most you can do is slow the rate of increase in prices. With a truly heroic effort, you might get house prices to slow their increase below the rate of increase in wages....
Pretty easy, I'd have thought. End buy-to-let. It would not increase the number of houses available but would reduce prices, initially by forcing a fire sale and later by ending price competition from would-be private landlords using BTL as an alternative to pensions or savings because interest rates are so low.
Building lots more houses, would solve that problem all on its own.
Nightmare. Every acre of green which goes impoverishes the country and nature.
Complete hairshirt envirofascist bollocks. An acre of green that goes won't even be noticeable to 99.9999% of the country and will provide a home to someone that needs it.
There is no alternative to increasing supply, other than expelling millions of people from the country. Anything else is just lies. You can't defeat supply and demand.
That doesn't mean concreting over the country. The UK will remain a green and pleasant land even if a few extra houses are built.
Aha. Furious Phil is back .
Although I was wrong.
An acre of land won't provide one home. It will provide about 18 homes at typical densities.
Now, this is an important point - density. The risk of zoning is that we end up with housing delivered at an inefficient density. There is a tension between the sorts of densities developers typically want to develop (typically considerably lower than 18 per acre, in suburban locations - often 14 is the top end) and the sorts that councils want (who would often be very happy with 18, but typically have to settle for 14 or less). Note that this is net density, and doesn't take into account extra bits and bobs like access roads, public open space, and on bigger sites schools, shops etc.
Long story short: on a large peripheral site you're doing well to get 10 an acre, gross.
Higher densities are good for all sorts of reasons - more efficient use of land, more walkable communities, better community spirit, more access to local services, local services able to be supported... - though obviously you need to do this in such a way you're not packing people into a slum.
It can happen, and there are examples of high quality high density development in both urban and rural locations (Poundbury in Dorset is often given as an example of the latter - many architects hate this, but I think it is great and it is popular with its residents; a similar community is being developed on the edge of Newquay in Cornwall). But my worry is that a simple 'zoning' approach will lead to low quality, low density neighbourhoods.
Lower density would be a good thing.
It means bigger houses, or bigger gardens, either way is a win.
Have you seen the outer suburbs of American or Australian cities? Yes, they have more land per house, which is nice for the inhabitants, but the houses are in a sea of identical houses. There are no neighbourhood centres, no pubs you can walk to, no stations, no pleasant little cafes - because the low densities mean the catchment population for these things is too low to make them viable.
And this isn't my particular hobbyhorse, but there are significant downsides to being a car dependent society.
I would rather live in a house with a modest garden and little space to my neighbours and be within walking distance of a school, a pub, a shop, a cafe, a station, a town centre - than have a massive house and a massive garden but be a drive from any of these. And if I make the former decision, that enables four or five more people to do the same.
Granted there is room in the market for both options, and I wouldn't want to say no more big new new builds in peripheral locations. Indeed, it's possible to do big new new builds in peripheral locations very well (Woodford Garden Village springs to mind). But I think the high quality high density option (18 dwellings per acre and above) in a functioning neighbourhood is more generally attractive, and the low density option has significant externalities.
The centre piece of forthcoming [planning] bill is still very much in place. The idea is to gut the existing planning system and replace it with American-style “zoning”. Local authorities would be forced to divide up their communities between three types of zone: “protected”, “renewal” and “growth”. In the growth zones, outline planning permission would be granted automatically to qualifying developments and the rights of local people to object drastically curtailed.
It’s pure political poison. Every “growth zone” in the country would be seen as a building site in waiting — and every one of them surrounded by angry, disenfranchised residents. So all the ingredients are in place for a major backbench rebellion: dozens of anxious MPs; a choice of high profile potential leaders — including Theresa May and Jeremy Hunt; an opportunistic opposition; a pitifully weak Secretary of State (Robert Jenrick); and, worst of all, a truly terrible set of policies that deserve to be torn to shreds anyway.
William Hague has argued that planning reform could be Boris Johnson’s Poll Tax. It’s a lot worse than that. The Poll Tax was an unforced error. And once Margaret Thatcher was out of the way, it was easy to reverse ferret. On planning reform, however, Boris Johnson is in a much tighter spot.
An article that goes on to float an alternative approach:
The alternative approach being to pick on a few places and force them to become cities against their will, rather than spreading new building everywhere?
Its an interesting approach. Start with Chesham and Amersham pour encourager les autres?
I didn't realise it was based on American-style “zoning”.
Wow.
Anyone who has been to the US can tell you what a mess the outskirts of their cities are.
This is Johnson's poll tax. And so early in his administration. I guess he will just go off and make money when he is ousted as Cummings noted.
UK house prices £366 ($511) per sq ft US house prices $155 (£111) per sq ft
So de Pfeffel wants to collapse house prices. Very brave.
Do you think high house prices are a good thing?
An increase in supply won't itself lead to a collapse in house prices, I wouldn't have thought, because it will happen gradually. All other things being equal (which they won't be), an increase in supply would lead to a gradual real terms reduction in house prices. Which would be a good thing.
I think we can generally agree that high house prices are bad but that house price collapses are bad. The only solution I see to this is gradual real terms reductions.
The key issue is, as touched on in that article, the proposed changes won't do much to bring house prices down or even slow their increase by much. It'll just piss off everyone affected, while enriching a handful of big developers (who will be the ones in full control over the supply and therefore in control over house prices).
One problem is the Politician's Syllogism: "Something must be done. This is something. It therefore must be done."
The suggestion in the article: "Planning reform, therefore, is largely irrelevant. A very different plan of action is required.
Firstly, the law should be used to exclude speculators from the housing market. We plan the location of new housing for environmental reasons and we should plan the ownership of new housing for social reasons. Most new houses should be reserved for first-time buyers and movers.
Free marketers might complain that this is distributism not capitalism. But so what? For a conservative, spreading home ownership should come before the purity of the market place.
On the supply side, government needs to break the big developers’ stranglehold on the land supply. It can do this by purchasing and preparing sites itself. A time-limited right to fully develop and sell-on plots could then be auctioned-off. Builders would thus be able to obtain the sites they need for houses they actually intend to build, but they’d have no need — nor the perverse incentive — to hold on to more land than that. "
... is key. And the planning reforms proposed won't do that. If anything, they'll move us further away from that. So we end up with no bringing down of house prices, poorly built rabbit hutches, big developers controlling the supply of housing, and really pissed off locals everywhere who are being completely ignored (get them involved and the problem really does reduce) and rapidly transition from dubious through NIMBY to BANANA.
Developers do not control the supply of land. They are usually just a convenient target who do not have votes.
That is done by local councils through the local plan development and zoning process. Landowners bring forward proposed sites (of which there are always more than needed), and teh Council rate them by their chosen criteria, make an ordered list and go down the list until their Housing Needs Assessment (which they also control) target has been met.
If the Council want more development land, they can allocate it.
The rub is that they often (as we have seen in C&A) do not want to do that, because their voters are self-serving Nimbys.
The article is weird - ill-informed, superficial, full of holes and impractical. I get the impression that he has never built anything other than with Lego.
On the proposal - why should the *Government* be the one buying plots. I thought the key objection was that the new proposal would take control AWAY from local communities. Give that power to the Local Authority, if someone must have it.
But it won't help, because it does not address the heart of the issue.
Developers do, however, have a huge interest in maintaining a tight grip on the supply of new houses in order to maximise their income. Most of the cost of a house is not in the house itself (in most parts of the coutry) but in the value of the land with planning permission underneath it.
My personal prediction is that local councils being forced to permit building will do little to nothing to promote house-building at the scale we need, because house builders don’t want to build at that rate - it lowers achievable prices whilst simultaneously driving up input costs (especially the labour cost of chippies, sparks etc etc).
In a free market developers can't refuse to build because if they do someone else will do the building instead and that someone else will make the profit instead.
The only way developers can refuse to build is if they have monopolistic powers, which doesn't happen in a free market because there's relatively low entry costs to this sector. The developers being the only ones who can navigate the planning system is what gives them monopolistic powers and why that doesn't exist in other nations with zonal planning where smaller developers or even self-building can exist instead.
As soon as they get the planning permission, there is no more free market. You can't roll up and build on a development site they've already got planning permission for. Even if they're building out really slowly.
A suggested fix -
If you apply for planning permission, you put the land into the agreement. If you get your planning permission and fail to build at an agreed rate - you lose the land.
I first came across Galloway when he was a councilor in Dundee pushing for Dundee to be twinned with Nablus, which it subsequently was. He was friends of a group of Palestinian activists in Dundee who shared a flat with a friend of mine. MI5 was not uninterested in some of this group and Galloway seemed to regard this as a badge of honour.
He seems to me very similar to the Corbyn mode of thinking. The point of these "freedom" groups around the world was not so much the morality of their cause but the fact that they hated the west, a contempt that both Corbyn and Galloway seemed to share. His support for that murdering thug Saddam Hussein seemed to come from the same source. If he opposed the west that was good enough for George (even if he had been our willing tool against Iran).
I find it a little odd that @NickPalmer can think so highly of Corbyn and yet so little of Galloway. They are cut from the same cloth. They both start off from the premise that everything we do is wrong, everything is done in our self interest, that we are hypocritical about it and that our establishment is beneath contempt. There have clearly been times when this assessment was not that wide of the mark but personally as a default I find it comes pretty close to treason. I find it dismaying that he finds such a ready audience in a significant minority in this country. It suggests a degree of alienation that can only lead to trouble.
He, of course, will seek to exploit it rather than try to smooth the troubled waters. Where he is clearly even more morally reprehensible than Corbyn is that he has been very content to make money out of doing so. In fairness, not even Corbyn sought to do that.
German chancellor Angela Merkel said this morning that Europe is “on thin ice” in its battle against the coronavirus, as the highly contagious delta variant threatens to undo progress made in reducing infections.
---
But its ok we are going to let everybody intermingle across Europe like last summer, especially the young who haven't been fully vaccinated.
Like last summer, except with all the Balearic nightclubs open and at capacity this year. What can possibly go wrong?
In The Blue Book of the War (written 1916, I think, reprinted 1917) there was a rather unexpected chapter on British submarine shenanigans going on in that area.
I read a book on the history of submarine warfare (possibly available on youtube as an audio book....) which covered those actions - very interesting
Yes - some of the characters involved were British Lunatic (standard issue).
Nasmith swimming out to an expended torpedo, from his submarine, to disarm it and then reload it for another go.....
In the Sea of Marmara? The/a book on that area in WW1 is one of the rippingest yarns in my naval bookcases. If there is more (ie around Crimea) that would be interesting.
Totally sick of seeing Gurning George Galloway in that stupid fucking hat. Seems to think he's Orson Welles or something. Well I've got news for him - he isn't.
I find it incredible that he moves from town to town like some old school snake oil salesman, but still in this modern era people buy into it.
I remember reading a description of Roy Jenkins campaigning in Warrington saying that people treated it like a royal visit. They didn't think he understood them but they were honoured to receive him. I wonder whether it's something similar with George Galloway. No one thinks he has any connection to the community but it's a bit of political star dust.
It means bigger houses, or bigger gardens, either way is a win.
No, this is bonkers. Both mean eating up available space with houses that are unaffordable for most people, thus making the crisis worse. The effect would be (a) more and more people unable to buy or rent homes or (b) more and more land area built on, i.e. urban sprawl on speed. High density (with the safeguards discussed elsewhere on the thread) is essential to any successful housing strategy, whether you want more owner-occupancy, more rented accommodation or both.
You need a mix of high and low density. High is fine for singles in cities, low is good for larger families. We already have some of the smallest new housing in Europe, so I think we need to move more towards lower density in suburban and rural areas.
This is a very useful guide to what different densities look like.
Also it is simply wrong to take the price of larger houses as given. If you build more of them in places where people want to live, the price will fall. Then more people will be able to afford them. If you don't, the price will rise with incomes and they will continue to be unaffordable as the population grows. That's the truly bonkers policy.
On topic, I don't have a clue what's going on in Batley & Spen. But I do know that the Labour Party should be engaging in a full-blown, no-holds barred character assassination of Galloway. Some good material in Nick Palmer's earlier post, and there's lots more out there. They need to take the gloves off and distribute an abundance of material to raise serious doubts about Galloway's character and commitment to the constituency in voters' minds. It shouldn't be that hard.
A "no-holds barred character assassination of Galloway" is what he wants.
If you fight dirty, then Galloway can certainly fight dirtier. And enjoy it.
That's always the problem in dealing with unscrupulous populists (Trump is the obvious recent example). If you attack them you make it all about them, which they enjoy and is part of their strategy. But if you don't then they get away with all kinds of rubbish. The Lincoln Project approach is one way of tackling them - have a third party attack the extremist while you get on with putting forward a positive case. It's tricky under electoral spending law in Britain - if one party will benefit, they need to declare it against the spending limit.
That said, I would not have any scruples about a negative campaign in this case, since there's ample evidence to make it truthful, as Al says - that doesn't actually make it dirty. The question is simply what works. By now, all the leaflets will have been printed, so we just need to see what happens. AFAIK, Labour has gone for the "ignore him" approach. If I was running the campaign I'd go for one targeted leaflet to demolish him amid the more positive stuff.
German chancellor Angela Merkel said this morning that Europe is “on thin ice” in its battle against the coronavirus, as the highly contagious delta variant threatens to undo progress made in reducing infections.
---
But its ok we are going to let everybody intermingle across Europe like last summer, especially the young who haven't been fully vaccinated.
Yesterday for the first timne in weeks to number of cases in Spain and the incidence rate both edged upwards. ATM the problem is confined to the north but in a couple of weeks large numbers of Spanish tourists will be heading to the costas without restrictions. They are racing to speed up the vaccinations but very few under 35s are likely to have had even 1 dose before July. It is a potential clusterfuck in the making.
Being in the bottom half of the draw seems a big advantage to me. That gives me Wijnaldum and Forsberg. I'm already on Wijnaldum up to my nads having backed him pre-tournament at 150 on the spreads and at 80/1 e/w with a bookie.
So that leave Forsberg (Sweden). He takes their penalties (big plus in this market - see Ronaldo), and Sweden is in the bottom half of the draw, playing Ukraine next. Top price with trad bookies is 66/1 but I just got 130 with BF.
Edit: worth pointing out that with the spreads this is a top goalscorer market not a Golden Boot market. Dead heat rules apply. None of this assist bollocks.
It means bigger houses, or bigger gardens, either way is a win.
No, this is bonkers. Both mean eating up available space with houses that are unaffordable for most people, thus making the crisis worse. The effect would be (a) more and more people unable to buy or rent homes or (b) more and more land area built on, i.e. urban sprawl on speed. High density (with the safeguards discussed elsewhere on the thread) is essential to any successful housing strategy, whether you want more owner-occupancy, more rented accommodation or both.
You need a mix of high and low density. High is fine for singles in cities, low is good for larger families. We already have some of the smallest new housing in Europe, so I think we need to move more towards lower density in suburban and rural areas.
This is a very useful guide to what different densities look like.
Also it is simply wrong to take the price of larger houses as given. If you build more of them in places where people want to live, the price will fall. Then more people will be able to afford them. If you don't, the price will rise with incomes and they will continue to be unaffordable as the population grows. That's the truly bonkers policy.
Yes. The actual cost of a larger house is not that much greater.
In The Blue Book of the War (written 1916, I think, reprinted 1917) there was a rather unexpected chapter on British submarine shenanigans going on in that area.
I read a book on the history of submarine warfare (possibly available on youtube as an audio book....) which covered those actions - very interesting
Yes - some of the characters involved were British Lunatic (standard issue).
Nasmith swimming out to an expended torpedo, from his submarine, to disarm it and then reload it for another go.....
In the Sea of Marmara? The/a book on that area in WW1 is one of the rippingest yarns in my naval bookcases. If there is more (ie around Crimea) that would be interesting.
Have you read any of the Oscar Prohaska books by John Biggins, one of which featured his hero commanding an Austro-Hungarian submarine in the Adriatic and I think the Black Sea? Good reads, maybe not O'Brien or Forester quality but better than their imitators.
And we'll be only let out for the mass application of leeches. So we need to know how to manage these events, OK. I'm really glad that they're doing the necessary planning now.
I see a sudden business opportunity in leech farming. If only I had a cabinet minister on speed dial to bung me the necessary start up cash...
Very good people with whom to do business, in my experience. Once sent a box up from S.Wales to Essex by motorcycle courier in significantly under 3 hours.
I'm re-watching Michael Palin's v enjoyable New Europe on Saturday evenings. He went to a leech doctor in Estonia; western liberal softie that I am I recoiled somewhat when the 'hirudotherapist' (as I learned I must call them) dispatched the leeches in caustic soda immediately afterwards!
Back to topic, if those rather frighteningly short odds against Galloway coming second came true Labour would come closer to a difficult decision with no good outcomes:
Does it continue to go for the Islamic vote, knowing that to do so alienates it from many in the centre and even centre left
or
Does it veer away from that dependency, allowing the Tories to mop up Islamic votes from moderates and assimilators, and allowing Galloway and his lookalikes to form a religion based party founded on the mixed up left/Islamic flank both mopping up a few seats in Bethnal Green and Bradford and denying Labour a lot of votes.
What odd is that a reputable poll recently showed Labour miles ahead of Galloway, while bookies/punters think this could easily be completely incorrect. How?
On Betfair at least the market is really thin, with ample scope for politically-motivated mischief - with £100 you can shift the main odds substantially either way. The Conservatives have an interest in talking up Galloway to split the Labour vote and are doing so - I wouldn't be a bit surprised if they've also thrown a few hundred into Betfair. In addition, the lure of getting long odds on an outsider always tempts people.
This doesn't mean that he's not making vast strides not seen by the poll last week, but it's a reason for caution in letting the state of the market decide your own position.
For me this is more complex. GG is a s*** clearly. However, if a significant group of voters are attracted to his ilk because of a perceived Labour weakness re Palestine, etc that illustrates graphically the mess the party has got itself in wrt factional issues.
Totally sick of seeing Gurning George Galloway in that stupid fucking hat. Seems to think he's Orson Welles or something. Well I've got news for him - he isn't.
I find it incredible that he moves from town to town like some old school snake oil salesman, but still in this modern era people buy into it.
I remember reading a description of Roy Jenkins campaigning in Warrington saying that people treated it like a royal visit. They didn't think he understood them but they were honoured to receive him. I wonder whether it's something similar with George Galloway. No one thinks he has any connection to the community but it's a bit of political star dust.
German chancellor Angela Merkel said this morning that Europe is “on thin ice” in its battle against the coronavirus, as the highly contagious delta variant threatens to undo progress made in reducing infections.
---
But its ok we are going to let everybody intermingle across Europe like last summer, especially the young who haven't been fully vaccinated.
Yesterday for the first timne in weeks to number of cases in Spain and the incidence rate both edged upwards. ATM the problem is confined to the north but in a couple of weeks large numbers of Spanish tourists will be heading to the costas without restrictions. They are racing to speed up the vaccinations but very few under 35s are likely to have had even 1 dose before July. It is a potential clusterfuck in the making.
I've also noticed that the areas around the Pembrokeshire seaside resorts (Tenby/Saundersfoot) have taken off as far as cases is concerned. It seems to be embedded in the local schools and seasonal workforce families. I'm sure it will blow over when it meets the vaccine wall of old age! I just hope that we don't experience a similar effect in September/October when the students go back!
German chancellor Angela Merkel said this morning that Europe is “on thin ice” in its battle against the coronavirus, as the highly contagious delta variant threatens to undo progress made in reducing infections.
---
But its ok we are going to let everybody intermingle across Europe like last summer, especially the young who haven't been fully vaccinated.
Like last summer, except with all the Balearic nightclubs open and at capacity this year. What can possibly go wrong?
I don't actually think the nightclubs have been allowed to open ..yet...
I first came across Galloway when he was a councilor in Dundee pushing for Dundee to be twinned with Nablus, which it subsequently was. He was friends of a group of Palestinian activists in Dundee who shared a flat with a friend of mine. MI5 was not uninterested in some of this group and Galloway seemed to regard this as a badge of honour.
He seems to me very similar to the Corbyn mode of thinking. The point of these "freedom" groups around the world was not so much the morality of their cause but the fact that they hated the west, a contempt that both Corbyn and Galloway seemed to share. His support for that murdering thug Saddam Hussein seemed to come from the same source. If he opposed the west that was good enough for George (even if he had been our willing tool against Iran).
I find it a little odd that @NickPalmer can think so highly of Corbyn and yet so little of Galloway. They are cut from the same cloth. They both start off from the premise that everything we do is wrong, everything is done in our self interest, that we are hypocritical about it and that our establishment is beneath contempt. There have clearly been times when this assessment was not that wide of the mark but personally as a default I find it comes pretty close to treason. I find it dismaying that he finds such a ready audience in a significant minority in this country. It suggests a degree of alienation that can only lead to trouble.
He, of course, will seek to exploit it rather than try to smooth the troubled waters. Where he is clearly even more morally reprehensible than Corbyn is that he has been very content to make money out of doing so. In fairness, not even Corbyn sought to do that.
Back to topic, if those rather frighteningly short odds against Galloway coming second came true Labour would come closer to a difficult decision with no good outcomes:
Does it continue to go for the Islamic vote, knowing that to do so alienates it from many in the centre and even centre left
or
Does it veer away from that dependency, allowing the Tories to mop up Islamic votes from moderates and assimilators, and allowing Galloway and his lookalikes to form a religion based party founded on the mixed up left/Islamic flank both mopping up a few seats in Bethnal Green and Bradford and denying Labour a lot of votes.
What odd is that a reputable poll recently showed Labour miles ahead of Galloway, while bookies/punters think this could easily be completely incorrect. How?
On Betfair at least the market is really thin, with ample scope for politically-motivated mischief - with £100 you can shift the main odds substantially either way. The Conservatives have an interest in talking up Galloway to split the Labour vote and are doing so - I wouldn't be a bit surprised if they've also thrown a few hundred into Betfair. In addition, the lure of getting long odds on an outsider always tempts people.
This doesn't mean that he's not making vast strides not seen by the poll last week, but it's a reason for caution in letting the state of the market decide your own position.
For me this is more complex. GG is a s*** clearly. However, if a significant group of voters are attracted to his ilk because of a perceived Labour weakness re Palestine, etc that illustrates graphically the mess the party has got itself in wrt factional issues.
The move to appoint Jo Cox's sister, whose application for Labour party membership was barely dry and, it turns out, is gay also looks somewhat less than inspired. I, and the vast majority of us, am completely indifferent to her sexual orientation but that is not the view that is taken by this alienated minority with rather more traditional views. It has created a vulnerability which did not need to exist. You can either regard that as morally creditworthy (we will not be bullied by these bigots) or politically naïve according to choice but it is hard to argue against the proposition that it has allowed Galloway to split the vote.
What is the limit of Galloway's potential in the constituency at this time:
He won 35% in Bethnal Green & Bow at the 2005 GE at the height of Iraq anger and in a even more favourable constituency than Batley & Spen.
He won 55% at Bradford West, also corralling the WWC vote.
He has had various small shares since.
He shed large portions of those votes at subsequent elections, but that is perhaps by-the-by.
I think both of the above were free hits, despite only one being a by-election. I also don't think he can carry that much of the WWC vote - many will generally know enough that he goes on incessantly about the Middle East in an era when Corbyn has made that toxic, why not just plump for the Tory if you want to kick Starmer.
So, I think his core vote this time will heavily tend to a section of the Muslim community and in B&S there is an upper limit to that, even if he does capture the imagination. I think his absolute ceiling if his campaign catches fire again is about 20%, but realistically hitting the 10-15% range would be a good result for him.
It would sink Labour, for sure, in fact I increasingly think Labour are sunk in B&S already and it'll be around a 4-5% Tory majority. That's from neck and neck a week ago. But Galloway in second - still probably not.
I first came across Galloway when he was a councilor in Dundee pushing for Dundee to be twinned with Nablus, which it subsequently was. He was friends of a group of Palestinian activists in Dundee who shared a flat with a friend of mine. MI5 was not uninterested in some of this group and Galloway seemed to regard this as a badge of honour.
He seems to me very similar to the Corbyn mode of thinking. The point of these "freedom" groups around the world was not so much the morality of their cause but the fact that they hated the west, a contempt that both Corbyn and Galloway seemed to share. His support for that murdering thug Saddam Hussein seemed to come from the same source. If he opposed the west that was good enough for George (even if he had been our willing tool against Iran).
I find it a little odd that @NickPalmer can think so highly of Corbyn and yet so little of Galloway. They are cut from the same cloth. They both start off from the premise that everything we do is wrong, everything is done in our self interest, that we are hypocritical about it and that our establishment is beneath contempt. There have clearly been times when this assessment was not that wide of the mark but personally as a default I find it comes pretty close to treason. I find it dismaying that he finds such a ready audience in a significant minority in this country. It suggests a degree of alienation that can only lead to trouble.
He, of course, will seek to exploit it rather than try to smooth the troubled waters. Where he is clearly even more morally reprehensible than Corbyn is that he has been very content to make money out of doing so. In fairness, not even Corbyn sought to do that.
Back to topic, if those rather frighteningly short odds against Galloway coming second came true Labour would come closer to a difficult decision with no good outcomes:
Does it continue to go for the Islamic vote, knowing that to do so alienates it from many in the centre and even centre left
or
Does it veer away from that dependency, allowing the Tories to mop up Islamic votes from moderates and assimilators, and allowing Galloway and his lookalikes to form a religion based party founded on the mixed up left/Islamic flank both mopping up a few seats in Bethnal Green and Bradford and denying Labour a lot of votes.
What odd is that a reputable poll recently showed Labour miles ahead of Galloway, while bookies/punters think this could easily be completely incorrect. How?
On Betfair at least the market is really thin, with ample scope for politically-motivated mischief - with £100 you can shift the main odds substantially either way. The Conservatives have an interest in talking up Galloway to split the Labour vote and are doing so - I wouldn't be a bit surprised if they've also thrown a few hundred into Betfair. In addition, the lure of getting long odds on an outsider always tempts people.
This doesn't mean that he's not making vast strides not seen by the poll last week, but it's a reason for caution in letting the state of the market decide your own position.
For me this is more complex. GG is a s*** clearly. However, if a significant group of voters are attracted to his ilk because of a perceived Labour weakness re Palestine, etc that illustrates graphically the mess the party has got itself in wrt factional issues.
The move to appoint Jo Cox's sister, whose application for Labour party membership was barely dry and, it turns out, is gay also looks somewhat less than inspired. I, and the vast majority of us, am completely indifferent to her sexual orientation but that is not the view that is taken by this alienated minority with rather more traditional views. It has created a vulnerability which did not need to exist. You can either regard that as morally creditworthy (we will not be bullied by these bigots) or politically naïve according to choice but it is hard to argue against the proposition that it has allowed Galloway to split the vote.
Simultanously naive and cowardly that they didn't realise how much of a problem it would be, but now it is a problem they're quietly absorbing attacks without commenting for fear of losing votes.
What is the limit of Galloway's potential in the constituency at this time:
He won 35% in Bethnal Green & Bow at the 2005 GE at the height of Iraq anger and in a even more favourable constituency than Batley & Spen.
He won 55% at Bradford West, also corralling the WWC vote.
He has had various small shares since.
He shed large portions of those votes at subsequent elections, but that is perhaps by-the-by.
I think both of the above were free hits, despite only one being a by-election. I also don't think he can carry that much of the WWC vote - many will generally know enough that he goes on incessantly about the Middle East in an era when Corbyn has made that toxic, why not just plump for the Tory if you want to kick Starmer.
So, I think his core vote this time will heavily tend to a section of the Muslim community and in B&S there is an upper limit to that, even if he does capture the imagination. I think his absolute ceiling if his campaign catches fire again is about 20%, but realistically hitting the 10-15% range would be a good result for him.
It would sink Labour, for sure, in fact I increasingly think Labour are sunk in B&S already and it'll be around a 4-5% Tory majority. That's from neck and neck a week ago. But Galloway in second - still probably not.
One other factor is whether Labour voters in 2019 are annoyed that their MP lasted about five minutes before departing for pastures greener and better-paid. There is a history of electorates not playing ball with parties calling by-elections to play musical chairs.
What is the limit of Galloway's potential in the constituency at this time:
He won 35% in Bethnal Green & Bow at the 2005 GE at the height of Iraq anger and in a even more favourable constituency than Batley & Spen.
He won 55% at Bradford West, also corralling the WWC vote.
He has had various small shares since.
He shed large portions of those votes at subsequent elections, but that is perhaps by-the-by.
I think both of the above were free hits, despite only one being a by-election. I also don't think he can carry that much of the WWC vote - many will generally know enough that he goes on incessantly about the Middle East in an era when Corbyn has made that toxic, why not just plump for the Tory if you want to kick Starmer.
So, I think his core vote this time will heavily tend to a section of the Muslim community and in B&S there is an upper limit to that, even if he does capture the imagination. I think his absolute ceiling if his campaign catches fire again is about 20%, but realistically hitting the 10-15% range would be a good result for him.
It would sink Labour, for sure, in fact I increasingly think Labour are sunk in B&S already and it'll be around a 4-5% Tory majority. That's from neck and neck a week ago. But Galloway in second - still probably not.
Hmm, I don't know. I could see people being enthusiastic to vote for Galloway in a way that they clearly aren't for Starmer, so differential turnout could also be a factor. Then there's momentum.
Regardless of his true level of support in the constituency, if people think he's doing well then enough of them might believe he's the best option to defeat the Tories to make it true.
Tories struggling to keep a straight face, of course.
Edit: I guess one question is to what extent his candidature exists on the ground in the constituency. Does he have a group of volunteers who can put the legwork in, or is it all at a community leaders/local paper sort of level?
The centre piece of forthcoming [planning] bill is still very much in place. The idea is to gut the existing planning system and replace it with American-style “zoning”. Local authorities would be forced to divide up their communities between three types of zone: “protected”, “renewal” and “growth”. In the growth zones, outline planning permission would be granted automatically to qualifying developments and the rights of local people to object drastically curtailed.
It’s pure political poison. Every “growth zone” in the country would be seen as a building site in waiting — and every one of them surrounded by angry, disenfranchised residents. So all the ingredients are in place for a major backbench rebellion: dozens of anxious MPs; a choice of high profile potential leaders — including Theresa May and Jeremy Hunt; an opportunistic opposition; a pitifully weak Secretary of State (Robert Jenrick); and, worst of all, a truly terrible set of policies that deserve to be torn to shreds anyway.
William Hague has argued that planning reform could be Boris Johnson’s Poll Tax. It’s a lot worse than that. The Poll Tax was an unforced error. And once Margaret Thatcher was out of the way, it was easy to reverse ferret. On planning reform, however, Boris Johnson is in a much tighter spot.
An article that goes on to float an alternative approach:
The alternative approach being to pick on a few places and force them to become cities against their will, rather than spreading new building everywhere?
Its an interesting approach. Start with Chesham and Amersham pour encourager les autres?
I didn't realise it was based on American-style “zoning”.
Wow.
Anyone who has been to the US can tell you what a mess the outskirts of their cities are.
This is Johnson's poll tax. And so early in his administration. I guess he will just go off and make money when he is ousted as Cummings noted.
UK house prices £366 ($511) per sq ft US house prices $155 (£111) per sq ft
So de Pfeffel wants to collapse house prices. Very brave.
Do you think high house prices are a good thing?
An increase in supply won't itself lead to a collapse in house prices, I wouldn't have thought, because it will happen gradually. All other things being equal (which they won't be), an increase in supply would lead to a gradual real terms reduction in house prices. Which would be a good thing.
I think we can generally agree that high house prices are bad but that house price collapses are bad. The only solution I see to this is gradual real terms reductions.
The key issue is, as touched on in that article, the proposed changes won't do much to bring house prices down or even slow their increase by much. It'll just piss off everyone affected, while enriching a handful of big developers (who will be the ones in full control over the supply and therefore in control over house prices).
One problem is the Politician's Syllogism: "Something must be done. This is something. It therefore must be done."
The suggestion in the article: "Planning reform, therefore, is largely irrelevant. A very different plan of action is required.
Firstly, the law should be used to exclude speculators from the housing market. We plan the location of new housing for environmental reasons and we should plan the ownership of new housing for social reasons. Most new houses should be reserved for first-time buyers and movers.
Free marketers might complain that this is distributism not capitalism. But so what? For a conservative, spreading home ownership should come before the purity of the market place.
On the supply side, government needs to break the big developers’ stranglehold on the land supply. It can do this by purchasing and preparing sites itself. A time-limited right to fully develop and sell-on plots could then be auctioned-off. Builders would thus be able to obtain the sites they need for houses they actually intend to build, but they’d have no need — nor the perverse incentive — to hold on to more land than that. "
... is key. And the planning reforms proposed won't do that. If anything, they'll move us further away from that. So we end up with no bringing down of house prices, poorly built rabbit hutches, big developers controlling the supply of housing, and really pissed off locals everywhere who are being completely ignored (get them involved and the problem really does reduce) and rapidly transition from dubious through NIMBY to BANANA.
Developers do not control the supply of land. They are usually just a convenient target who do not have votes.
That is done by local councils through the local plan development and zoning process. Landowners bring forward proposed sites (of which there are always more than needed), and teh Council rate them by their chosen criteria, make an ordered list and go down the list until their Housing Needs Assessment (which they also control) target has been met.
If the Council want more development land, they can allocate it.
The rub is that they often (as we have seen in C&A) do not want to do that, because their voters are self-serving Nimbys.
The article is weird - ill-informed, superficial, full of holes and impractical. I get the impression that he has never built anything other than with Lego.
On the proposal - why should the *Government* be the one buying plots. I thought the key objection was that the new proposal would take control AWAY from local communities. Give that power to the Local Authority, if someone must have it.
But it won't help, because it does not address the heart of the issue.
Nope. Once a developer has a site approved, they have control over it. One of our sites: thousands of houses, planning permission going through. Developer states "we will build out over 25 years". I ask: "why so long?" Them: "Market conditions." [ie: we don't want to build out rapidly enough to bring prices down]
Should the reforms go through and big developers can just roll up with auto-approval on all large sites, they get the planning permission, it's their site, they build out at the speed they like. The speed they like is the one that keeps cashflow coming in as long as possible without putting prices down.
They're fully aware of market forces; they aren't idiots. It's perfectly rational from their side.
(NB: Local Authorities don't control the number of houses they are deemed to need. They get to discuss and argue it, but that's imposed on them)
It's also worth remembering that big property companies are terrible about implementing the infrastructure they promise local communities when developing new sites. On the estate I live on the property company took the better part of 5 years to build a bridge across a railway line into town. The estate was effectively cut off if you didn't drive or fancied a really long walk. Reducing the ability of local councils to exert control is just going to give them even less insensitive to fulfill their community promises.
On the contrary, the councils have already proved that they’re unable to hold developers to account. They should be able to insist on timelines from developers. If the infrastructure isn’t completed, then the houses don’t get completion certificates.
In The Blue Book of the War (written 1916, I think, reprinted 1917) there was a rather unexpected chapter on British submarine shenanigans going on in that area.
I read a book on the history of submarine warfare (possibly available on youtube as an audio book....) which covered those actions - very interesting
Yes - some of the characters involved were British Lunatic (standard issue).
Nasmith swimming out to an expended torpedo, from his submarine, to disarm it and then reload it for another go.....
In the Sea of Marmara? The/a book on that area in WW1 is one of the rippingest yarns in my naval bookcases. If there is more (ie around Crimea) that would be interesting.
Have you read any of the Oscar Prohaska books by John Biggins, one of which featured his hero commanding an Austro-Hungarian submarine in the Adriatic and I think the Black Sea? Good reads, maybe not O'Brien or Forester quality but better than their imitators.
No! Will try ***looks up and orders***.
I have fished out he book I had idn mind and it is in fact Dardanelles Patrol by Shankland and Hunter - one of those war paperbacks so common when we were weans and callants. About (the real) Naismith and E.11. But no less ripping a yarn for not being fiction.
Back to topic, if those rather frighteningly short odds against Galloway coming second came true Labour would come closer to a difficult decision with no good outcomes:
Does it continue to go for the Islamic vote, knowing that to do so alienates it from many in the centre and even centre left
or
Does it veer away from that dependency, allowing the Tories to mop up Islamic votes from moderates and assimilators, and allowing Galloway and his lookalikes to form a religion based party founded on the mixed up left/Islamic flank both mopping up a few seats in Bethnal Green and Bradford and denying Labour a lot of votes.
What odd is that a reputable poll recently showed Labour miles ahead of Galloway, while bookies/punters think this could easily be completely incorrect. How?
On Betfair at least the market is really thin, with ample scope for politically-motivated mischief - with £100 you can shift the main odds substantially either way. The Conservatives have an interest in talking up Galloway to split the Labour vote and are doing so - I wouldn't be a bit surprised if they've also thrown a few hundred into Betfair. In addition, the lure of getting long odds on an outsider always tempts people.
This doesn't mean that he's not making vast strides not seen by the poll last week, but it's a reason for caution in letting the state of the market decide your own position.
For me this is more complex. GG is a s*** clearly. However, if a significant group of voters are attracted to his ilk because of a perceived Labour weakness re Palestine, etc that illustrates graphically the mess the party has got itself in wrt factional issues.
The move to appoint Jo Cox's sister, whose application for Labour party membership was barely dry and, it turns out, is gay also looks somewhat less than inspired. I, and the vast majority of us, am completely indifferent to her sexual orientation but that is not the view that is taken by this alienated minority with rather more traditional views. It has created a vulnerability which did not need to exist. You can either regard that as morally creditworthy (we will not be bullied by these bigots) or politically naïve according to choice but it is hard to argue against the proposition that it has allowed Galloway to split the vote.
Simultanously naive and cowardly that they didn't realise how much of a problem it would be, but now it is a problem they're quietly absorbing attacks without commenting for fear of losing votes.
It is another good example of the complete disconnect between the modern Labour party and those that they expect to vote for them. It's not just Brexit, their modern, liberal, woke, metropolitan outlook is a million miles from the social views of their strongest supporters in ethnic minorities and the Muslim community. SKS completely personifies this viewpoint.
I personally have a general sympathy with much of their views being socially liberal myself but as social attitudes seem to take over from economic issues Labour face a world of pain outside their University/metropolitan strongholds.
German chancellor Angela Merkel said this morning that Europe is “on thin ice” in its battle against the coronavirus, as the highly contagious delta variant threatens to undo progress made in reducing infections.
---
But its ok we are going to let everybody intermingle across Europe like last summer, especially the young who haven't been fully vaccinated.
Like last summer, except with all the Balearic nightclubs open and at capacity this year. What can possibly go wrong?
I don't actually think the nightclubs have been allowed to open ..yet...
In The Blue Book of the War (written 1916, I think, reprinted 1917) there was a rather unexpected chapter on British submarine shenanigans going on in that area.
I read a book on the history of submarine warfare (possibly available on youtube as an audio book....) which covered those actions - very interesting
Yes - some of the characters involved were British Lunatic (standard issue).
Nasmith swimming out to an expended torpedo, from his submarine, to disarm it and then reload it for another go.....
In the Sea of Marmara? The/a book on that area in WW1 is one of the rippingest yarns in my naval bookcases. If there is more (ie around Crimea) that would be interesting.
Have you read any of the Oscar Prohaska books by John Biggins, one of which featured his hero commanding an Austro-Hungarian submarine in the Adriatic and I think the Black Sea? Good reads, maybe not O'Brien or Forester quality but better than their imitators.
No! Will try ***looks up and orders***.
I have fished out he book I had idn mind and it is in fact Dardanelles Patrol by Shankland and Hunter - one of those war paperbacks so common when we were weans and callants. About (the real) Naismith and E.11. But no less ripping a yarn for not being fiction.
The RN WWI submarine service in general reads like a ripping yarn - Dardanelles, the Baltic etc - and full of colourful characters...
Back to topic, if those rather frighteningly short odds against Galloway coming second came true Labour would come closer to a difficult decision with no good outcomes:
Does it continue to go for the Islamic vote, knowing that to do so alienates it from many in the centre and even centre left
or
Does it veer away from that dependency, allowing the Tories to mop up Islamic votes from moderates and assimilators, and allowing Galloway and his lookalikes to form a religion based party founded on the mixed up left/Islamic flank both mopping up a few seats in Bethnal Green and Bradford and denying Labour a lot of votes.
What odd is that a reputable poll recently showed Labour miles ahead of Galloway, while bookies/punters think this could easily be completely incorrect. How?
On Betfair at least the market is really thin, with ample scope for politically-motivated mischief - with £100 you can shift the main odds substantially either way. The Conservatives have an interest in talking up Galloway to split the Labour vote and are doing so - I wouldn't be a bit surprised if they've also thrown a few hundred into Betfair. In addition, the lure of getting long odds on an outsider always tempts people.
This doesn't mean that he's not making vast strides not seen by the poll last week, but it's a reason for caution in letting the state of the market decide your own position.
For me this is more complex. GG is a s*** clearly. However, if a significant group of voters are attracted to his ilk because of a perceived Labour weakness re Palestine, etc that illustrates graphically the mess the party has got itself in wrt factional issues.
The move to appoint Jo Cox's sister, whose application for Labour party membership was barely dry and, it turns out, is gay also looks somewhat less than inspired. I, and the vast majority of us, am completely indifferent to her sexual orientation but that is not the view that is taken by this alienated minority with rather more traditional views. It has created a vulnerability which did not need to exist. You can either regard that as morally creditworthy (we will not be bullied by these bigots) or politically naïve according to choice but it is hard to argue against the proposition that it has allowed Galloway to split the vote.
Simultanously naive and cowardly that they didn't realise how much of a problem it would be, but now it is a problem they're quietly absorbing attacks without commenting for fear of losing votes.
It is another good example of the complete disconnect between the modern Labour party and those that they expect to vote for them. It's not just Brexit, their modern, liberal, woke, metropolitan outlook is a million miles from the social views of their strongest supporters in ethnic minorities and the Muslim community. SKS completely personifies this viewpoint.
I personally have a general sympathy with much of their views being socially liberal myself but as social attitudes seem to take over from economic issues Labour face a world of pain outside their University/metropolitan strongholds.
It seems to me to show that they are increasingly not a national party and not just in the geographical sense of the word. I think they may be deep in the doo doo to coin a phrase and worst of all, I do not think they realise how serious the problem is. Corbyn did not start this process but his tenure has made the problem a great deal more difficult. Huge opportunity for the LDs/Greens but , despite C & A, I'm unsure the former are able to exploit this.
Back to topic, if those rather frighteningly short odds against Galloway coming second came true Labour would come closer to a difficult decision with no good outcomes:
Does it continue to go for the Islamic vote, knowing that to do so alienates it from many in the centre and even centre left
or
Does it veer away from that dependency, allowing the Tories to mop up Islamic votes from moderates and assimilators, and allowing Galloway and his lookalikes to form a religion based party founded on the mixed up left/Islamic flank both mopping up a few seats in Bethnal Green and Bradford and denying Labour a lot of votes.
What odd is that a reputable poll recently showed Labour miles ahead of Galloway, while bookies/punters think this could easily be completely incorrect. How?
On Betfair at least the market is really thin, with ample scope for politically-motivated mischief - with £100 you can shift the main odds substantially either way. The Conservatives have an interest in talking up Galloway to split the Labour vote and are doing so - I wouldn't be a bit surprised if they've also thrown a few hundred into Betfair. In addition, the lure of getting long odds on an outsider always tempts people.
This doesn't mean that he's not making vast strides not seen by the poll last week, but it's a reason for caution in letting the state of the market decide your own position.
For me this is more complex. GG is a s*** clearly. However, if a significant group of voters are attracted to his ilk because of a perceived Labour weakness re Palestine, etc that illustrates graphically the mess the party has got itself in wrt factional issues.
The move to appoint Jo Cox's sister, whose application for Labour party membership was barely dry and, it turns out, is gay also looks somewhat less than inspired. I, and the vast majority of us, am completely indifferent to her sexual orientation but that is not the view that is taken by this alienated minority with rather more traditional views. It has created a vulnerability which did not need to exist. You can either regard that as morally creditworthy (we will not be bullied by these bigots) or politically naïve according to choice but it is hard to argue against the proposition that it has allowed Galloway to split the vote.
Simultanously naive and cowardly that they didn't realise how much of a problem it would be, but now it is a problem they're quietly absorbing attacks without commenting for fear of losing votes.
It is another good example of the complete disconnect between the modern Labour party and those that they expect to vote for them. It's not just Brexit, their modern, liberal, woke, metropolitan outlook is a million miles from the social views of their strongest supporters in ethnic minorities and the Muslim community. SKS completely personifies this viewpoint.
I personally have a general sympathy with much of their views being socially liberal myself but as social attitudes seem to take over from economic issues Labour face a world of pain outside their University/metropolitan strongholds.
Sadly, as we move to a more diverse society, both big parties are likely to find their coalitions want inconsistent things. The LDs can fudge it as noone takes them seriously (apart from themselves) but for the Conservatives and Labour it's going to be an increasing problem.
The only thing the leadership can hope for is that dislike of the other side trumps the dislike of other parts of the coalition. It may work, but it's not a recipe for harmonious politics.
Back to topic, if those rather frighteningly short odds against Galloway coming second came true Labour would come closer to a difficult decision with no good outcomes:
Does it continue to go for the Islamic vote, knowing that to do so alienates it from many in the centre and even centre left
or
Does it veer away from that dependency, allowing the Tories to mop up Islamic votes from moderates and assimilators, and allowing Galloway and his lookalikes to form a religion based party founded on the mixed up left/Islamic flank both mopping up a few seats in Bethnal Green and Bradford and denying Labour a lot of votes.
What odd is that a reputable poll recently showed Labour miles ahead of Galloway, while bookies/punters think this could easily be completely incorrect. How?
On Betfair at least the market is really thin, with ample scope for politically-motivated mischief - with £100 you can shift the main odds substantially either way. The Conservatives have an interest in talking up Galloway to split the Labour vote and are doing so - I wouldn't be a bit surprised if they've also thrown a few hundred into Betfair. In addition, the lure of getting long odds on an outsider always tempts people.
This doesn't mean that he's not making vast strides not seen by the poll last week, but it's a reason for caution in letting the state of the market decide your own position.
For me this is more complex. GG is a s*** clearly. However, if a significant group of voters are attracted to his ilk because of a perceived Labour weakness re Palestine, etc that illustrates graphically the mess the party has got itself in wrt factional issues.
The move to appoint Jo Cox's sister, whose application for Labour party membership was barely dry and, it turns out, is gay also looks somewhat less than inspired. I, and the vast majority of us, am completely indifferent to her sexual orientation but that is not the view that is taken by this alienated minority with rather more traditional views. It has created a vulnerability which did not need to exist. You can either regard that as morally creditworthy (we will not be bullied by these bigots) or politically naïve according to choice but it is hard to argue against the proposition that it has allowed Galloway to split the vote.
Simultanously naive and cowardly that they didn't realise how much of a problem it would be, but now it is a problem they're quietly absorbing attacks without commenting for fear of losing votes.
It is another good example of the complete disconnect between the modern Labour party and those that they expect to vote for them. It's not just Brexit, their modern, liberal, woke, metropolitan outlook is a million miles from the social views of their strongest supporters in ethnic minorities and the Muslim community. SKS completely personifies this viewpoint.
I personally have a general sympathy with much of their views being socially liberal myself but as social attitudes seem to take over from economic issues Labour face a world of pain outside their University/metropolitan strongholds.
It seems to me to show that they are increasingly not a national party and not just in the geographical sense of the word. I think they may be deep in the doo doo to coin a phrase and worst of all, I do not think they realise how serious the problem is. Corbyn did not start this process but his tenure has made the problem a great deal more difficult. Huge opportunity for the LDs/Greens but , despite C & A, I'm unsure the former are able to exploit this.
The problem with the Lib Dems is that they are even worse:
So they want freedom of movement but not more housing. They want more public transport but not HS2 They want more public spending on just about everything but lower taxes (if fairness they are very far from alone in this).
I first came across Galloway when he was a councilor in Dundee pushing for Dundee to be twinned with Nablus, which it subsequently was. He was friends of a group of Palestinian activists in Dundee who shared a flat with a friend of mine. MI5 was not uninterested in some of this group and Galloway seemed to regard this as a badge of honour.
He seems to me very similar to the Corbyn mode of thinking. The point of these "freedom" groups around the world was not so much the morality of their cause but the fact that they hated the west, a contempt that both Corbyn and Galloway seemed to share. His support for that murdering thug Saddam Hussein seemed to come from the same source. If he opposed the west that was good enough for George (even if he had been our willing tool against Iran).
I find it a little odd that @NickPalmer can think so highly of Corbyn and yet so little of Galloway. They are cut from the same cloth. They both start off from the premise that everything we do is wrong, everything is done in our self interest, that we are hypocritical about it and that our establishment is beneath contempt. There have clearly been times when this assessment was not that wide of the mark but personally as a default I find it comes pretty close to treason. I find it dismaying that he finds such a ready audience in a significant minority in this country. It suggests a degree of alienation that can only lead to trouble.
He, of course, will seek to exploit it rather than try to smooth the troubled waters. Where he is clearly even more morally reprehensible than Corbyn is that he has been very content to make money out of doing so. In fairness, not even Corbyn sought to do that.
Just on the personal point, as you ask, I know them both, and IMO Corbyn is scrupulously honest and personally austere, and (also IMO) Galloway is neither. Thus, I credit Corbyn with a genuine sense of sympathy for people in places like Palestine (not primarily driven by reaction to British policies) and I don't credit Galloway with genuine sympathy for anyone except himself. That's separate on whether they're right about particular issues. In the same way, I think Steve Baker is a genuine Brexiteer and Farage is much more of a chancer - I don't agree with either of them, but I'd rather trust Baker or Corbyn to look after a pet cat, even if Galloway might like to copy it.
What is the limit of Galloway's potential in the constituency at this time:
He won 35% in Bethnal Green & Bow at the 2005 GE at the height of Iraq anger and in a even more favourable constituency than Batley & Spen.
He won 55% at Bradford West, also corralling the WWC vote.
He has had various small shares since.
He shed large portions of those votes at subsequent elections, but that is perhaps by-the-by.
I think both of the above were free hits, despite only one being a by-election. I also don't think he can carry that much of the WWC vote - many will generally know enough that he goes on incessantly about the Middle East in an era when Corbyn has made that toxic, why not just plump for the Tory if you want to kick Starmer.
So, I think his core vote this time will heavily tend to a section of the Muslim community and in B&S there is an upper limit to that, even if he does capture the imagination. I think his absolute ceiling if his campaign catches fire again is about 20%, but realistically hitting the 10-15% range would be a good result for him.
It would sink Labour, for sure, in fact I increasingly think Labour are sunk in B&S already and it'll be around a 4-5% Tory majority. That's from neck and neck a week ago. But Galloway in second - still probably not.
The worry has to be that, on a small turnout, he could get well up into the 30s of votes cast with 20% support in the constituency, and the imams telling everyone at prayers tomorrow to go vote for him.
"That's a matter for individual countries to decide their own policies as we do ours. We will continue to speak to our European partners about the reopening of travel in a safe and secure way."
What is the limit of Galloway's potential in the constituency at this time:
He won 35% in Bethnal Green & Bow at the 2005 GE at the height of Iraq anger and in a even more favourable constituency than Batley & Spen.
He won 55% at Bradford West, also corralling the WWC vote.
He has had various small shares since.
He shed large portions of those votes at subsequent elections, but that is perhaps by-the-by.
I think both of the above were free hits, despite only one being a by-election. I also don't think he can carry that much of the WWC vote - many will generally know enough that he goes on incessantly about the Middle East in an era when Corbyn has made that toxic, why not just plump for the Tory if you want to kick Starmer.
So, I think his core vote this time will heavily tend to a section of the Muslim community and in B&S there is an upper limit to that, even if he does capture the imagination. I think his absolute ceiling if his campaign catches fire again is about 20%, but realistically hitting the 10-15% range would be a good result for him.
It would sink Labour, for sure, in fact I increasingly think Labour are sunk in B&S already and it'll be around a 4-5% Tory majority. That's from neck and neck a week ago. But Galloway in second - still probably not.
One other factor is whether Labour voters in 2019 are annoyed that their MP lasted about five minutes before departing for pastures greener and better-paid. There is a history of electorates not playing ball with parties calling by-elections to play musical chairs.
It may not be universal, but I think a lot of people can see the point of mayors and you look at Andy Burnham and think, yeah, we should have a piece of that. The people of B&S did, in part, vote directly to have this by-election. So, a three time in 5 year elected candidate moving along to that role oughtn't play too badly in itself.
Holy smokes, a huge increase in case numbers for Wales. I know it's a low base and so forth and there are no deaths. Nevertheless at the very least it is... epidemiologically interesting..
It would sink Labour, for sure, in fact I increasingly think Labour are sunk in B&S already and it'll be around a 4-5% Tory majority. That's from neck and neck a week ago. But Galloway in second - still probably not.
The worry has to be that, on a small turnout, he could get well up into the 30s of votes cast with 20% support in the constituency, and the imams telling everyone at prayers tomorrow to go vote for him.
Haven't heard of imams on side - his alliance is with several dissident local councillors, no?
According to Labour reports from the ground, he is having an impact (hard to be sure how much) but only in two wards. In particular, he seems to be entirely absent from Spen (which IIRC the Survation poll also suggested). I do agree that his impact could well lose Labour the seat.
Holy smokes, a huge increase in case numbers for Wales. I know it's a low base and so forth and there are no deaths. Nevertheless at the very least it is... epidemiologically interesting..
Football almost certainly. Wonder what the male/female split of the cases
Sadly, as we move to a more diverse society, both big parties are likely to find their coalitions want inconsistent things. The LDs can fudge it as noone takes them seriously (apart from themselves) but for the Conservatives and Labour it's going to be an increasing problem.
The only thing the leadership can hope for is that dislike of the other side trumps the dislike of other parts of the coalition. It may work, but it's not a recipe for harmonious politics.
Yes, you're right. I remember how depressed I felt in 2010, when Labour had really run out of ideas and our appeal was entirely "Stop the Tories!" There's more of that in Labour's appeal than I like at the moment too.
The solution, if not an entirely palatable one, is to find a personality who appeals across different types of people even if they wouldn't really agree with their detailed views. Johnson reaches out by hearty cheeriness, Blair did it by can-do charisma. Common to both is a sense of optimism - people are drawn to leaders who tell them that a better future is available, "just over there if you follow me"... Those of us are really into political detail tend to underestimate that kind of appeal. And despite what I've said I do worry that Galloway has a bit of it too.
Mr. Palmer, provides a ready excuse for Starmer if Labour lose but the margin of Conservative victory is smaller than the Galloway vote.
It does but it serves only to highlight the much bigger issue of a party caught between contradictory factions and afraid to speak up for its beliefs - something which should remain a concern for Jewish communities in this country. The by-election itself is only of fleeting significance - as they nearly always are.
I first came across Galloway when he was a councilor in Dundee pushing for Dundee to be twinned with Nablus, which it subsequently was. He was friends of a group of Palestinian activists in Dundee who shared a flat with a friend of mine. MI5 was not uninterested in some of this group and Galloway seemed to regard this as a badge of honour.
He seems to me very similar to the Corbyn mode of thinking. The point of these "freedom" groups around the world was not so much the morality of their cause but the fact that they hated the west, a contempt that both Corbyn and Galloway seemed to share. His support for that murdering thug Saddam Hussein seemed to come from the same source. If he opposed the west that was good enough for George (even if he had been our willing tool against Iran).
I find it a little odd that @NickPalmer can think so highly of Corbyn and yet so little of Galloway. They are cut from the same cloth. They both start off from the premise that everything we do is wrong, everything is done in our self interest, that we are hypocritical about it and that our establishment is beneath contempt. There have clearly been times when this assessment was not that wide of the mark but personally as a default I find it comes pretty close to treason. I find it dismaying that he finds such a ready audience in a significant minority in this country. It suggests a degree of alienation that can only lead to trouble.
He, of course, will seek to exploit it rather than try to smooth the troubled waters. Where he is clearly even more morally reprehensible than Corbyn is that he has been very content to make money out of doing so. In fairness, not even Corbyn sought to do that.
Just on the personal point, as you ask, I know them both, and IMO Corbyn is scrupulously honest and personally austere, and (also IMO) Galloway is neither. Thus, I credit Corbyn with a genuine sense of sympathy for people in places like Palestine (not primarily driven by reaction to British policies) and I don't credit Galloway with genuine sympathy for anyone except himself. That's separate on whether they're right about particular issues. In the same way, I think Steve Baker is a genuine Brexiteer and Farage is much more of a chancer - I don't agree with either of them, but I'd rather trust Baker or Corbyn to look after a pet cat, even if Galloway might like to copy it.
Indeed, when people say that Labour just need to find a left-wing Boris Johnson and make him leader, I can't help fearing that would end up with someone a lot like Gorgeous George.
Mr. Rata, point of order, though: Yorkshire generally seems to want a county-wide mayor, something utterly rejected by Westminster types.
There was a lot of squabbling between the parties locally too. The Tories, who rule the roost in N Yorks and the like, were worried they would be ruled over perpetually by a Labour mayor elected by more numerous Labour voters from other areas.
Sadly, as we move to a more diverse society, both big parties are likely to find their coalitions want inconsistent things. The LDs can fudge it as noone takes them seriously (apart from themselves) but for the Conservatives and Labour it's going to be an increasing problem.
The only thing the leadership can hope for is that dislike of the other side trumps the dislike of other parts of the coalition. It may work, but it's not a recipe for harmonious politics.
Yes, you're right. I remember how depressed I felt in 2010, when Labour had really run out of ideas and our appeal was entirely "Stop the Tories!" There's more of that in Labour's appeal than I like at the moment too.
The solution, if not an entirely palatable one, is to find a personality who appeals across different types of people even if they wouldn't really agree with their detailed views. Johnson reaches out by hearty cheeriness, Blair did it by can-do charisma. Common to both is a sense of optimism - people are drawn to leaders who tell them that a better future is available, "just over there if you follow me"... Those of us are really into political detail tend to underestimate that kind of appeal. And despite what I've said I do worry that Galloway has a bit of it too.
That person is not in the current Parliament.it will be a long road back. Its stop Labour at all costs atm.... and I will vote for that...
The worry has to be that, on a small turnout, he could get well up into the 30s of votes cast with 20% support in the constituency, and the imams telling everyone at prayers tomorrow to go vote for him.
Haven't heard of imams on side - his alliance is with several dissident local councillors, no?
According to Labour reports from the ground, he is having an impact (hard to be sure how much) but only in two wards. In particular, he seems to be entirely absent from Spen (which IIRC the Survation poll also suggested). I do agree that his impact could well lose Labour the seat.
Someone mentioned mosques being on board with GG, on here earlier in the week.
Hopefully he isn’t having too much of an impact, it’s not good to see his divisive style of politics succeeding.
Sadly, as we move to a more diverse society, both big parties are likely to find their coalitions want inconsistent things. The LDs can fudge it as noone takes them seriously (apart from themselves) but for the Conservatives and Labour it's going to be an increasing problem.
The only thing the leadership can hope for is that dislike of the other side trumps the dislike of other parts of the coalition. It may work, but it's not a recipe for harmonious politics.
Yes, you're right. I remember how depressed I felt in 2010, when Labour had really run out of ideas and our appeal was entirely "Stop the Tories!" There's more of that in Labour's appeal than I like at the moment too.
The solution, if not an entirely palatable one, is to find a personality who appeals across different types of people even if they wouldn't really agree with their detailed views. Johnson reaches out by hearty cheeriness, Blair did it by can-do charisma. Common to both is a sense of optimism - people are drawn to leaders who tell them that a better future is available, "just over there if you follow me"... Those of us are really into political detail tend to underestimate that kind of appeal. And despite what I've said I do worry that Galloway has a bit of it too.
I actually thought you were going to propose the other solution, which is to have a voting system whereby each interest group can have its own party without being obliterated as they would be under FPTP, unless they are geographically based.
But that has the obvious problem that governing coalitions are formed between parties, rather than within them, which is not obviously better and arguably worse.
O/T, just on the whole OBON thing, I do think politics should be kept out of especially primary schools but it is hilarious to see those most vehemently criticising the idea for politicising children are exactly the same types who would be shoving every single doctrine of their own down childrens' throats if they had half a chance.
I actually thought you were going to propose the other solution, which is to have a voting system whereby each interest group can have its own party without being obliterated as they would be under FPTP, unless they are geographically based.
But that has the obvious problem that governing coalitions are formed between parties, rather than within them, which is not obviously better and arguably worse.
Yes, I do support PR too, despite the drawback that you rightly identify - it provides transparency on what voters actually think and encourages positive appeals ("Vote against X" doesn't work with PR since there are more alternatives). The coalition negotiations can then build on what the real flow of opinion is.
What is the limit of Galloway's potential in the constituency at this time:
He won 35% in Bethnal Green & Bow at the 2005 GE at the height of Iraq anger and in a even more favourable constituency than Batley & Spen.
He won 55% at Bradford West, also corralling the WWC vote.
He has had various small shares since.
He shed large portions of those votes at subsequent elections, but that is perhaps by-the-by.
I think both of the above were free hits, despite only one being a by-election. I also don't think he can carry that much of the WWC vote - many will generally know enough that he goes on incessantly about the Middle East in an era when Corbyn has made that toxic, why not just plump for the Tory if you want to kick Starmer.
So, I think his core vote this time will heavily tend to a section of the Muslim community and in B&S there is an upper limit to that, even if he does capture the imagination. I think his absolute ceiling if his campaign catches fire again is about 20%, but realistically hitting the 10-15% range would be a good result for him.
It would sink Labour, for sure, in fact I increasingly think Labour are sunk in B&S already and it'll be around a 4-5% Tory majority. That's from neck and neck a week ago. But Galloway in second - still probably not.
The worry has to be that, on a small turnout, he could get well up into the 30s of votes cast with 20% support in the constituency, and the imams telling everyone at prayers tomorrow to go vote for him.
If that's true and they are basing that decision on the fact Starmers wife is Jewish and the Labour candidate is a Lesbian it is a very sad state of affairs and does not bode well for future
What is the limit of Galloway's potential in the constituency at this time:
He won 35% in Bethnal Green & Bow at the 2005 GE at the height of Iraq anger and in a even more favourable constituency than Batley & Spen.
He won 55% at Bradford West, also corralling the WWC vote.
He has had various small shares since.
He shed large portions of those votes at subsequent elections, but that is perhaps by-the-by.
I think both of the above were free hits, despite only one being a by-election. I also don't think he can carry that much of the WWC vote - many will generally know enough that he goes on incessantly about the Middle East in an era when Corbyn has made that toxic, why not just plump for the Tory if you want to kick Starmer.
So, I think his core vote this time will heavily tend to a section of the Muslim community and in B&S there is an upper limit to that, even if he does capture the imagination. I think his absolute ceiling if his campaign catches fire again is about 20%, but realistically hitting the 10-15% range would be a good result for him.
It would sink Labour, for sure, in fact I increasingly think Labour are sunk in B&S already and it'll be around a 4-5% Tory majority. That's from neck and neck a week ago. But Galloway in second - still probably not.
The worry has to be that, on a small turnout, he could get well up into the 30s of votes cast with 20% support in the constituency, and the imams telling everyone at prayers tomorrow to go vote for him.
If that's true and they are basing that decision on the fact Starmers wife is Jewish and the Labour candidate is a Lesbian it is a very sad state of affairs and does not bode well for future
This is what 'rubbing the right's nose in diversity' looks like.
O/T, just on the whole OBON thing, I do think politics should be kept out of especially primary schools but it is hilarious to see those most vehemently criticising the idea for politicising children are exactly the same types who would be shoving every single doctrine of their own down childrens' throats if they had half a chance.
Well done for not getting overly distracted by criticising something that’s ball achingly crap and the people who are doing that crap from the main task of criticising people who aren’t doing that crap.
Ms Cherry has accepted instructions through Beltrami and Company to defend Ms Millar, who has been charged by police with offences under s.127 of the Communications Act 2003 over her social media activity in 2019.
Ms Millar, an accountant, had retweeted an image of a bow of ribbons in the Suffragette colours of green, white and purple that was tied around a tree outside of the Glasgow studio in which a BBC soap opera was being filmed.
The police received a complaint about the image on the basis the ribbons represented a noose. The nature of other complaints made against Ms Millar is unknown.
Ms Cherry has accepted instructions through Beltrami and Company to defend Ms Millar, who has been charged by police with offences under s.127 of the Communications Act 2003 over her social media activity in 2019.
Ms Millar, an accountant, had retweeted an image of a bow of ribbons in the Suffragette colours of green, white and purple that was tied around a tree outside of the Glasgow studio in which a BBC soap opera was being filmed.
The police received a complaint about the image on the basis the ribbons represented a noose. The nature of other complaints made against Ms Millar is unknown.
Ms Cherry has accepted instructions through Beltrami and Company to defend Ms Millar, who has been charged by police with offences under s.127 of the Communications Act 2003 over her social media activity in 2019.
Ms Millar, an accountant, had retweeted an image of a bow of ribbons in the Suffragette colours of green, white and purple that was tied around a tree outside of the Glasgow studio in which a BBC soap opera was being filmed.
The police received a complaint about the image on the basis the ribbons represented a noose. The nature of other complaints made against Ms Millar is unknown.
Images from Google Street View show that the concrete was in a poor state, which might not be a surprise given it faces the sea, and storms throwing up salt are frequent.
Another failure of building inspectors (or the lack of them). More Ponte Morandi than Grenfell, I think, although of course we had a similar collapse (due to a gas explosion) in Newham in the 1960s.
Ms Cherry has accepted instructions through Beltrami and Company to defend Ms Millar, who has been charged by police with offences under s.127 of the Communications Act 2003 over her social media activity in 2019.
Ms Millar, an accountant, had retweeted an image of a bow of ribbons in the Suffragette colours of green, white and purple that was tied around a tree outside of the Glasgow studio in which a BBC soap opera was being filmed.
The police received a complaint about the image on the basis the ribbons represented a noose. The nature of other complaints made against Ms Millar is unknown.
The centre piece of forthcoming [planning] bill is still very much in place. The idea is to gut the existing planning system and replace it with American-style “zoning”. Local authorities would be forced to divide up their communities between three types of zone: “protected”, “renewal” and “growth”. In the growth zones, outline planning permission would be granted automatically to qualifying developments and the rights of local people to object drastically curtailed.
It’s pure political poison. Every “growth zone” in the country would be seen as a building site in waiting — and every one of them surrounded by angry, disenfranchised residents. So all the ingredients are in place for a major backbench rebellion: dozens of anxious MPs; a choice of high profile potential leaders — including Theresa May and Jeremy Hunt; an opportunistic opposition; a pitifully weak Secretary of State (Robert Jenrick); and, worst of all, a truly terrible set of policies that deserve to be torn to shreds anyway.
William Hague has argued that planning reform could be Boris Johnson’s Poll Tax. It’s a lot worse than that. The Poll Tax was an unforced error. And once Margaret Thatcher was out of the way, it was easy to reverse ferret. On planning reform, however, Boris Johnson is in a much tighter spot.
An article that goes on to float an alternative approach:
The alternative approach being to pick on a few places and force them to become cities against their will, rather than spreading new building everywhere?
Its an interesting approach. Start with Chesham and Amersham pour encourager les autres?
I didn't realise it was based on American-style “zoning”.
Wow.
Anyone who has been to the US can tell you what a mess the outskirts of their cities are.
This is Johnson's poll tax. And so early in his administration. I guess he will just go off and make money when he is ousted as Cummings noted.
UK house prices £366 ($511) per sq ft US house prices $155 (£111) per sq ft
So de Pfeffel wants to collapse house prices. Very brave.
Do you think high house prices are a good thing?
An increase in supply won't itself lead to a collapse in house prices, I wouldn't have thought, because it will happen gradually. All other things being equal (which they won't be), an increase in supply would lead to a gradual real terms reduction in house prices. Which would be a good thing.
I think we can generally agree that high house prices are bad but that house price collapses are bad. The only solution I see to this is gradual real terms reductions.
The key issue is, as touched on in that article, the proposed changes won't do much to bring house prices down or even slow their increase by much. It'll just piss off everyone affected, while enriching a handful of big developers (who will be the ones in full control over the supply and therefore in control over house prices).
One problem is the Politician's Syllogism: "Something must be done. This is something. It therefore must be done."
The suggestion in the article: "Planning reform, therefore, is largely irrelevant. A very different plan of action is required.
Firstly, the law should be used to exclude speculators from the housing market. We plan the location of new housing for environmental reasons and we should plan the ownership of new housing for social reasons. Most new houses should be reserved for first-time buyers and movers.
Free marketers might complain that this is distributism not capitalism. But so what? For a conservative, spreading home ownership should come before the purity of the market place.
On the supply side, government needs to break the big developers’ stranglehold on the land supply. It can do this by purchasing and preparing sites itself. A time-limited right to fully develop and sell-on plots could then be auctioned-off. Builders would thus be able to obtain the sites they need for houses they actually intend to build, but they’d have no need — nor the perverse incentive — to hold on to more land than that. "
... is key. And the planning reforms proposed won't do that. If anything, they'll move us further away from that. So we end up with no bringing down of house prices, poorly built rabbit hutches, big developers controlling the supply of housing, and really pissed off locals everywhere who are being completely ignored (get them involved and the problem really does reduce) and rapidly transition from dubious through NIMBY to BANANA.
Developers do not control the supply of land. They are usually just a convenient target who do not have votes.
That is done by local councils through the local plan development and zoning process. Landowners bring forward proposed sites (of which there are always more than needed), and teh Council rate them by their chosen criteria, make an ordered list and go down the list until their Housing Needs Assessment (which they also control) target has been met.
If the Council want more development land, they can allocate it.
The rub is that they often (as we have seen in C&A) do not want to do that, because their voters are self-serving Nimbys.
The article is weird - ill-informed, superficial, full of holes and impractical. I get the impression that he has never built anything other than with Lego.
On the proposal - why should the *Government* be the one buying plots. I thought the key objection was that the new proposal would take control AWAY from local communities. Give that power to the Local Authority, if someone must have it.
But it won't help, because it does not address the heart of the issue.
Developers do, however, have a huge interest in maintaining a tight grip on the supply of new houses in order to maximise their income. Most of the cost of a house is not in the house itself (in most parts of the coutry) but in the value of the land with planning permission underneath it.
My personal prediction is that local councils being forced to permit building will do little to nothing to promote house-building at the scale we need, because house builders don’t want to build at that rate - it lowers achievable prices whilst simultaneously driving up input costs (especially the labour cost of chippies, sparks etc etc).
In a free market developers can't refuse to build because if they do someone else will do the building instead and that someone else will make the profit instead.
The only way developers can refuse to build is if they have monopolistic powers, which doesn't happen in a free market because there's relatively low entry costs to this sector. The developers being the only ones who can navigate the planning system is what gives them monopolistic powers and why that doesn't exist in other nations with zonal planning where smaller developers or even self-building can exist instead.
As soon as they get the planning permission, there is no more free market. You can't roll up and build on a development site they've already got planning permission for. Even if they're building out really slowly.
A suggested fix -
If you apply for planning permission, you put the land into the agreement. If you get your planning permission and fail to build at an agreed rate - you lose the land.
"We've been delayed by x, y, z. We couldn't have anticipated [a pandemic/archeological discoveries/delays in receipt of building materials/staff illness/new legislation to comply with/unexpected birthday party] (delete as applicable). However, we have made a meaningful start as agreed."
Once a meaningful start has been made on a site, they're free and clear. I'd guess the original intent was to give them confidence that they won't have the rug pulled out from under them when buildings were half built. These days - well, I'm still a bit unsure about what "meaningful start" is supposed to mean; I've seen at least one site where I couldn't have told anything had happened. But they'd "made a meaningful start" so they were in the clear.
The centre piece of forthcoming [planning] bill is still very much in place. The idea is to gut the existing planning system and replace it with American-style “zoning”. Local authorities would be forced to divide up their communities between three types of zone: “protected”, “renewal” and “growth”. In the growth zones, outline planning permission would be granted automatically to qualifying developments and the rights of local people to object drastically curtailed.
It’s pure political poison. Every “growth zone” in the country would be seen as a building site in waiting — and every one of them surrounded by angry, disenfranchised residents. So all the ingredients are in place for a major backbench rebellion: dozens of anxious MPs; a choice of high profile potential leaders — including Theresa May and Jeremy Hunt; an opportunistic opposition; a pitifully weak Secretary of State (Robert Jenrick); and, worst of all, a truly terrible set of policies that deserve to be torn to shreds anyway.
William Hague has argued that planning reform could be Boris Johnson’s Poll Tax. It’s a lot worse than that. The Poll Tax was an unforced error. And once Margaret Thatcher was out of the way, it was easy to reverse ferret. On planning reform, however, Boris Johnson is in a much tighter spot.
An article that goes on to float an alternative approach:
The alternative approach being to pick on a few places and force them to become cities against their will, rather than spreading new building everywhere?
Its an interesting approach. Start with Chesham and Amersham pour encourager les autres?
I didn't realise it was based on American-style “zoning”.
Wow.
Anyone who has been to the US can tell you what a mess the outskirts of their cities are.
This is Johnson's poll tax. And so early in his administration. I guess he will just go off and make money when he is ousted as Cummings noted.
UK house prices £366 ($511) per sq ft US house prices $155 (£111) per sq ft
So de Pfeffel wants to collapse house prices. Very brave.
Do you think high house prices are a good thing?
An increase in supply won't itself lead to a collapse in house prices, I wouldn't have thought, because it will happen gradually. All other things being equal (which they won't be), an increase in supply would lead to a gradual real terms reduction in house prices. Which would be a good thing.
I think we can generally agree that high house prices are bad but that house price collapses are bad. The only solution I see to this is gradual real terms reductions.
The key issue is, as touched on in that article, the proposed changes won't do much to bring house prices down or even slow their increase by much. It'll just piss off everyone affected, while enriching a handful of big developers (who will be the ones in full control over the supply and therefore in control over house prices).
One problem is the Politician's Syllogism: "Something must be done. This is something. It therefore must be done."
The suggestion in the article: "Planning reform, therefore, is largely irrelevant. A very different plan of action is required.
Firstly, the law should be used to exclude speculators from the housing market. We plan the location of new housing for environmental reasons and we should plan the ownership of new housing for social reasons. Most new houses should be reserved for first-time buyers and movers.
Free marketers might complain that this is distributism not capitalism. But so what? For a conservative, spreading home ownership should come before the purity of the market place.
On the supply side, government needs to break the big developers’ stranglehold on the land supply. It can do this by purchasing and preparing sites itself. A time-limited right to fully develop and sell-on plots could then be auctioned-off. Builders would thus be able to obtain the sites they need for houses they actually intend to build, but they’d have no need — nor the perverse incentive — to hold on to more land than that. "
... is key. And the planning reforms proposed won't do that. If anything, they'll move us further away from that. So we end up with no bringing down of house prices, poorly built rabbit hutches, big developers controlling the supply of housing, and really pissed off locals everywhere who are being completely ignored (get them involved and the problem really does reduce) and rapidly transition from dubious through NIMBY to BANANA.
Developers do not control the supply of land. They are usually just a convenient target who do not have votes.
That is done by local councils through the local plan development and zoning process. Landowners bring forward proposed sites (of which there are always more than needed), and teh Council rate them by their chosen criteria, make an ordered list and go down the list until their Housing Needs Assessment (which they also control) target has been met.
If the Council want more development land, they can allocate it.
The rub is that they often (as we have seen in C&A) do not want to do that, because their voters are self-serving Nimbys.
The article is weird - ill-informed, superficial, full of holes and impractical. I get the impression that he has never built anything other than with Lego.
On the proposal - why should the *Government* be the one buying plots. I thought the key objection was that the new proposal would take control AWAY from local communities. Give that power to the Local Authority, if someone must have it.
But it won't help, because it does not address the heart of the issue.
Developers do, however, have a huge interest in maintaining a tight grip on the supply of new houses in order to maximise their income. Most of the cost of a house is not in the house itself (in most parts of the coutry) but in the value of the land with planning permission underneath it.
My personal prediction is that local councils being forced to permit building will do little to nothing to promote house-building at the scale we need, because house builders don’t want to build at that rate - it lowers achievable prices whilst simultaneously driving up input costs (especially the labour cost of chippies, sparks etc etc).
In a free market developers can't refuse to build because if they do someone else will do the building instead and that someone else will make the profit instead.
The only way developers can refuse to build is if they have monopolistic powers, which doesn't happen in a free market because there's relatively low entry costs to this sector. The developers being the only ones who can navigate the planning system is what gives them monopolistic powers and why that doesn't exist in other nations with zonal planning where smaller developers or even self-building can exist instead.
As soon as they get the planning permission, there is no more free market. You can't roll up and build on a development site they've already got planning permission for. Even if they're building out really slowly.
A suggested fix -
If you apply for planning permission, you put the land into the agreement. If you get your planning permission and fail to build at an agreed rate - you lose the land.
"We've been delayed by x, y, z. We couldn't have anticipated [a pandemic/archeological discoveries/delays in receipt of building materials/staff illness/new legislation to comply with/unexpected birthday party] (delete as applicable). However, we have made a meaningful start as agreed."
Once a meaningful start has been made on a site, they're free and clear. I'd guess the original intent was to give them confidence that they won't have the rug pulled out from under them when buildings were half built. These days - well, I'm still a bit unsure about what "meaningful start" is supposed to mean; I've seen at least one site where I couldn't have told anything had happened. But they'd "made a meaningful start" so they were in the clear.
It can't mean clearing the site, because half of the time that gets done before the planning permission is requested. Just to make sure there's no ecology left.
Ms Cherry has accepted instructions through Beltrami and Company to defend Ms Millar, who has been charged by police with offences under s.127 of the Communications Act 2003 over her social media activity in 2019.
Ms Millar, an accountant, had retweeted an image of a bow of ribbons in the Suffragette colours of green, white and purple that was tied around a tree outside of the Glasgow studio in which a BBC soap opera was being filmed.
The police received a complaint about the image on the basis the ribbons represented a noose. The nature of other complaints made against Ms Millar is unknown.
It looks horribly like she’s been charged because of who she is, rather than what she did. How is retweeting a photo of some ribbons a criminal offence, if the original post isn’t, and neither is putting the ribbons there in the first place?
The centre piece of forthcoming [planning] bill is still very much in place. The idea is to gut the existing planning system and replace it with American-style “zoning”. Local authorities would be forced to divide up their communities between three types of zone: “protected”, “renewal” and “growth”. In the growth zones, outline planning permission would be granted automatically to qualifying developments and the rights of local people to object drastically curtailed.
It’s pure political poison. Every “growth zone” in the country would be seen as a building site in waiting — and every one of them surrounded by angry, disenfranchised residents. So all the ingredients are in place for a major backbench rebellion: dozens of anxious MPs; a choice of high profile potential leaders — including Theresa May and Jeremy Hunt; an opportunistic opposition; a pitifully weak Secretary of State (Robert Jenrick); and, worst of all, a truly terrible set of policies that deserve to be torn to shreds anyway.
William Hague has argued that planning reform could be Boris Johnson’s Poll Tax. It’s a lot worse than that. The Poll Tax was an unforced error. And once Margaret Thatcher was out of the way, it was easy to reverse ferret. On planning reform, however, Boris Johnson is in a much tighter spot.
An article that goes on to float an alternative approach:
The alternative approach being to pick on a few places and force them to become cities against their will, rather than spreading new building everywhere?
Its an interesting approach. Start with Chesham and Amersham pour encourager les autres?
I didn't realise it was based on American-style “zoning”.
Wow.
Anyone who has been to the US can tell you what a mess the outskirts of their cities are.
This is Johnson's poll tax. And so early in his administration. I guess he will just go off and make money when he is ousted as Cummings noted.
UK house prices £366 ($511) per sq ft US house prices $155 (£111) per sq ft
So de Pfeffel wants to collapse house prices. Very brave.
Do you think high house prices are a good thing?
An increase in supply won't itself lead to a collapse in house prices, I wouldn't have thought, because it will happen gradually. All other things being equal (which they won't be), an increase in supply would lead to a gradual real terms reduction in house prices. Which would be a good thing.
I think we can generally agree that high house prices are bad but that house price collapses are bad. The only solution I see to this is gradual real terms reductions.
The key issue is, as touched on in that article, the proposed changes won't do much to bring house prices down or even slow their increase by much. It'll just piss off everyone affected, while enriching a handful of big developers (who will be the ones in full control over the supply and therefore in control over house prices).
One problem is the Politician's Syllogism: "Something must be done. This is something. It therefore must be done."
The suggestion in the article: "Planning reform, therefore, is largely irrelevant. A very different plan of action is required.
Firstly, the law should be used to exclude speculators from the housing market. We plan the location of new housing for environmental reasons and we should plan the ownership of new housing for social reasons. Most new houses should be reserved for first-time buyers and movers.
Free marketers might complain that this is distributism not capitalism. But so what? For a conservative, spreading home ownership should come before the purity of the market place.
On the supply side, government needs to break the big developers’ stranglehold on the land supply. It can do this by purchasing and preparing sites itself. A time-limited right to fully develop and sell-on plots could then be auctioned-off. Builders would thus be able to obtain the sites they need for houses they actually intend to build, but they’d have no need — nor the perverse incentive — to hold on to more land than that. "
... is key. And the planning reforms proposed won't do that. If anything, they'll move us further away from that. So we end up with no bringing down of house prices, poorly built rabbit hutches, big developers controlling the supply of housing, and really pissed off locals everywhere who are being completely ignored (get them involved and the problem really does reduce) and rapidly transition from dubious through NIMBY to BANANA.
Developers do not control the supply of land. They are usually just a convenient target who do not have votes.
That is done by local councils through the local plan development and zoning process. Landowners bring forward proposed sites (of which there are always more than needed), and teh Council rate them by their chosen criteria, make an ordered list and go down the list until their Housing Needs Assessment (which they also control) target has been met.
If the Council want more development land, they can allocate it.
The rub is that they often (as we have seen in C&A) do not want to do that, because their voters are self-serving Nimbys.
The article is weird - ill-informed, superficial, full of holes and impractical. I get the impression that he has never built anything other than with Lego.
On the proposal - why should the *Government* be the one buying plots. I thought the key objection was that the new proposal would take control AWAY from local communities. Give that power to the Local Authority, if someone must have it.
But it won't help, because it does not address the heart of the issue.
Developers do, however, have a huge interest in maintaining a tight grip on the supply of new houses in order to maximise their income. Most of the cost of a house is not in the house itself (in most parts of the coutry) but in the value of the land with planning permission underneath it.
My personal prediction is that local councils being forced to permit building will do little to nothing to promote house-building at the scale we need, because house builders don’t want to build at that rate - it lowers achievable prices whilst simultaneously driving up input costs (especially the labour cost of chippies, sparks etc etc).
In a free market developers can't refuse to build because if they do someone else will do the building instead and that someone else will make the profit instead.
The only way developers can refuse to build is if they have monopolistic powers, which doesn't happen in a free market because there's relatively low entry costs to this sector. The developers being the only ones who can navigate the planning system is what gives them monopolistic powers and why that doesn't exist in other nations with zonal planning where smaller developers or even self-building can exist instead.
As soon as they get the planning permission, there is no more free market. You can't roll up and build on a development site they've already got planning permission for. Even if they're building out really slowly.
That's the point though, the requirement for permission is what is distorting the market!
Currently they can get permission for thousands of homes and then that's that and nobody else gets permission (since thousands have been approved) and they're a monopoly provider.
But if there's zonal planning so that permission doesn't need to be gained thousands at a time then unless the developer buys the entire zone if they buy some of it and plan to develop it slowly, someone else can buy another bit of the zone and develop that instead.
Indeed liberate the market enough and instead of developers with thousands of homes, you can break it down to people building just one house at a time.
The whole point of properly liberalising the market properly isn't to build over everything green (nobody wants that nor is there demand for that), but to break away the anticompetitive practices that planning creates.
Ms Cherry has accepted instructions through Beltrami and Company to defend Ms Millar, who has been charged by police with offences under s.127 of the Communications Act 2003 over her social media activity in 2019.
Ms Millar, an accountant, had retweeted an image of a bow of ribbons in the Suffragette colours of green, white and purple that was tied around a tree outside of the Glasgow studio in which a BBC soap opera was being filmed.
The police received a complaint about the image on the basis the ribbons represented a noose. The nature of other complaints made against Ms Millar is unknown.
It looks horribly like she’s been charged because of who she is, rather than what she did. How is retweeting a photo of some ribbons a criminal offence, if the original post isn’t, and neither is putting the ribbons there in the first place?
UK a really needs a First Amendment.
Doesn't say that the polis are actuially acting on the 'noose' complaint. And "The nature of other complaints made against Ms Millar is unknown."
The centre piece of forthcoming [planning] bill is still very much in place. The idea is to gut the existing planning system and replace it with American-style “zoning”. Local authorities would be forced to divide up their communities between three types of zone: “protected”, “renewal” and “growth”. In the growth zones, outline planning permission would be granted automatically to qualifying developments and the rights of local people to object drastically curtailed.
It’s pure political poison. Every “growth zone” in the country would be seen as a building site in waiting — and every one of them surrounded by angry, disenfranchised residents. So all the ingredients are in place for a major backbench rebellion: dozens of anxious MPs; a choice of high profile potential leaders — including Theresa May and Jeremy Hunt; an opportunistic opposition; a pitifully weak Secretary of State (Robert Jenrick); and, worst of all, a truly terrible set of policies that deserve to be torn to shreds anyway.
William Hague has argued that planning reform could be Boris Johnson’s Poll Tax. It’s a lot worse than that. The Poll Tax was an unforced error. And once Margaret Thatcher was out of the way, it was easy to reverse ferret. On planning reform, however, Boris Johnson is in a much tighter spot.
An article that goes on to float an alternative approach:
The alternative approach being to pick on a few places and force them to become cities against their will, rather than spreading new building everywhere?
Its an interesting approach. Start with Chesham and Amersham pour encourager les autres?
I didn't realise it was based on American-style “zoning”.
Wow.
Anyone who has been to the US can tell you what a mess the outskirts of their cities are.
This is Johnson's poll tax. And so early in his administration. I guess he will just go off and make money when he is ousted as Cummings noted.
UK house prices £366 ($511) per sq ft US house prices $155 (£111) per sq ft
So de Pfeffel wants to collapse house prices. Very brave.
Do you think high house prices are a good thing?
An increase in supply won't itself lead to a collapse in house prices, I wouldn't have thought, because it will happen gradually. All other things being equal (which they won't be), an increase in supply would lead to a gradual real terms reduction in house prices. Which would be a good thing.
I think we can generally agree that high house prices are bad but that house price collapses are bad. The only solution I see to this is gradual real terms reductions.
Unless we built houses on the scale of an emergency program to build prefabs in factories, trucked to site and put up at a rate of 100s per day (think https://www.huf-haus.com/en-uk/ multiplied by the Manhattan Project), it won't be possible for supply to exceed demand.
The most you can do is slow the rate of increase in prices. With a truly heroic effort, you might get house prices to slow their increase below the rate of increase in wages....
Pretty easy, I'd have thought. End buy-to-let. It would not increase the number of houses available but would reduce prices, initially by forcing a fire sale and later by ending price competition from would-be private landlords using BTL as an alternative to pensions or savings because interest rates are so low.
Building lots more houses, would solve that problem all on its own.
Nightmare. Every acre of green which goes impoverishes the country and nature.
Complete hairshirt envirofascist bollocks. An acre of green that goes won't even be noticeable to 99.9999% of the country and will provide a home to someone that needs it.
There is no alternative to increasing supply, other than expelling millions of people from the country. Anything else is just lies. You can't defeat supply and demand.
That doesn't mean concreting over the country. The UK will remain a green and pleasant land even if a few extra houses are built.
Aha. Furious Phil is back .
Although I was wrong.
An acre of land won't provide one home. It will provide about 18 homes at typical densities.
Now, this is an important point - density. The risk of zoning is that we end up with housing delivered at an inefficient density. There is a tension between the sorts of densities developers typically want to develop (typically considerably lower than 18 per acre, in suburban locations - often 14 is the top end) and the sorts that councils want (who would often be very happy with 18, but typically have to settle for 14 or less). Note that this is net density, and doesn't take into account extra bits and bobs like access roads, public open space, and on bigger sites schools, shops etc.
Long story short: on a large peripheral site you're doing well to get 10 an acre, gross.
Higher densities are good for all sorts of reasons - more efficient use of land, more walkable communities, better community spirit, more access to local services, local services able to be supported... - though obviously you need to do this in such a way you're not packing people into a slum.
It can happen, and there are examples of high quality high density development in both urban and rural locations (Poundbury in Dorset is often given as an example of the latter - many architects hate this, but I think it is great and it is popular with its residents; a similar community is being developed on the edge of Newquay in Cornwall). But my worry is that a simple 'zoning' approach will lead to low quality, low density neighbourhoods.
Lower density would be a good thing.
It means bigger houses, or bigger gardens, either way is a win.
Have you seen the outer suburbs of American or Australian cities? Yes, they have more land per house, which is nice for the inhabitants, but the houses are in a sea of identical houses. There are no neighbourhood centres, no pubs you can walk to, no stations, no pleasant little cafes - because the low densities mean the catchment population for these things is too low to make them viable.
And this isn't my particular hobbyhorse, but there are significant downsides to being a car dependent society.
I would rather live in a house with a modest garden and little space to my neighbours and be within walking distance of a school, a pub, a shop, a cafe, a station, a town centre - than have a massive house and a massive garden but be a drive from any of these. And if I make the former decision, that enables four or five more people to do the same.
Granted there is room in the market for both options, and I wouldn't want to say no more big new new builds in peripheral locations. Indeed, it's possible to do big new new builds in peripheral locations very well (Woodford Garden Village springs to mind). But I think the high quality high density option (18 dwellings per acre and above) in a functioning neighbourhood is more generally attractive, and the low density option has significant externalities.
I think that there are certain things out planning system can do quite well - esp. compared to most other countries, and one of those is maintaining local diversity.
That is partly through the intensive individual feedback on house by house applications which is possible (which drives many self-builders spare).
I think we often underestimate the extent to which land scarcity and intensive use impacts on planning - our property laws going back centuries are shot through with the assumption that using all the land is important. One example is the possibility of adverse possession just because no one else is using a piece of land.
It means bigger houses, or bigger gardens, either way is a win.
No, this is bonkers. Both mean eating up available space with houses that are unaffordable for most people, thus making the crisis worse. The effect would be (a) more and more people unable to buy or rent homes or (b) more and more land area built on, i.e. urban sprawl on speed. High density (with the safeguards discussed elsewhere on the thread) is essential to any successful housing strategy, whether you want more owner-occupancy, more rented accommodation or both.
That's just not true and it doesn't matter if the homes built are unaffordable for most people.
Hypothetically i you build in a town a thousand luxury homes that can only be bought by the well off then what happens? The well off buy their new homes, move out, sell their old homes and someone else can buy the old homes.
That's the whole notion of chains and ladders that exists throughout the market.
You don't need to keep shovelling more s**t boxes at the bottom of the market.
Back to topic, if those rather frighteningly short odds against Galloway coming second came true Labour would come closer to a difficult decision with no good outcomes:
Does it continue to go for the Islamic vote, knowing that to do so alienates it from many in the centre and even centre left
or
Does it veer away from that dependency, allowing the Tories to mop up Islamic votes from moderates and assimilators, and allowing Galloway and his lookalikes to form a religion based party founded on the mixed up left/Islamic flank both mopping up a few seats in Bethnal Green and Bradford and denying Labour a lot of votes.
What odd is that a reputable poll recently showed Labour miles ahead of Galloway, while bookies/punters think this could easily be completely incorrect. How?
On Betfair at least the market is really thin, with ample scope for politically-motivated mischief - with £100 you can shift the main odds substantially either way. The Conservatives have an interest in talking up Galloway to split the Labour vote and are doing so - I wouldn't be a bit surprised if they've also thrown a few hundred into Betfair. In addition, the lure of getting long odds on an outsider always tempts people.
This doesn't mean that he's not making vast strides not seen by the poll last week, but it's a reason for caution in letting the state of the market decide your own position.
For me this is more complex. GG is a s*** clearly. However, if a significant group of voters are attracted to his ilk because of a perceived Labour weakness re Palestine, etc that illustrates graphically the mess the party has got itself in wrt factional issues.
The move to appoint Jo Cox's sister, whose application for Labour party membership was barely dry and, it turns out, is gay also looks somewhat less than inspired. I, and the vast majority of us, am completely indifferent to her sexual orientation but that is not the view that is taken by this alienated minority with rather more traditional views. It has created a vulnerability which did not need to exist. You can either regard that as morally creditworthy (we will not be bullied by these bigots) or politically naïve according to choice but it is hard to argue against the proposition that it has allowed Galloway to split the vote.
I just find this funny. Its why I follow politics, observing politicians try to wrestle with enormous contradictions in the hopeless pursuit of a better world is an endless source of private amusement.
I think that building and holding election winning coalitions is now more difficult for Labour than the Tories because their members and hard core supporters are much more ideologically driven. Every political and culture wars battle has the capability of fracturing Labour much more than the Tories: 1. Trans activism versus "traditional" feminism. 2. Racial identity politics versus traditional socialism and class based politics. 3. Feminism, anti-racism, gay rights versus conservative Islam. 4. Palestine as a hot button acts as gateway drug to anti-semitism and drives off many voters, WWC and non-Moslem ethnic minorities. 5. All identity politics versus diminishing but still significant working class vote.
That's not to mention other challenges like residual Remain versus Brexit and economic policy which also challenge the Tories of course. Probably the Tories will be more pragmatic even on those topics if they need to be..
Holy smokes, a huge increase in case numbers for Wales. I know it's a low base and so forth and there are no deaths. Nevertheless at the very least it is... epidemiologically interesting..
Football almost certainly. Wonder what the male/female split of the cases
Very strong pro-male split in Scotland in 25-44s from what the Beeb say on their website.
The centre piece of forthcoming [planning] bill is still very much in place. The idea is to gut the existing planning system and replace it with American-style “zoning”. Local authorities would be forced to divide up their communities between three types of zone: “protected”, “renewal” and “growth”. In the growth zones, outline planning permission would be granted automatically to qualifying developments and the rights of local people to object drastically curtailed.
It’s pure political poison. Every “growth zone” in the country would be seen as a building site in waiting — and every one of them surrounded by angry, disenfranchised residents. So all the ingredients are in place for a major backbench rebellion: dozens of anxious MPs; a choice of high profile potential leaders — including Theresa May and Jeremy Hunt; an opportunistic opposition; a pitifully weak Secretary of State (Robert Jenrick); and, worst of all, a truly terrible set of policies that deserve to be torn to shreds anyway.
William Hague has argued that planning reform could be Boris Johnson’s Poll Tax. It’s a lot worse than that. The Poll Tax was an unforced error. And once Margaret Thatcher was out of the way, it was easy to reverse ferret. On planning reform, however, Boris Johnson is in a much tighter spot.
An article that goes on to float an alternative approach:
The alternative approach being to pick on a few places and force them to become cities against their will, rather than spreading new building everywhere?
Its an interesting approach. Start with Chesham and Amersham pour encourager les autres?
I didn't realise it was based on American-style “zoning”.
Wow.
Anyone who has been to the US can tell you what a mess the outskirts of their cities are.
This is Johnson's poll tax. And so early in his administration. I guess he will just go off and make money when he is ousted as Cummings noted.
UK house prices £366 ($511) per sq ft US house prices $155 (£111) per sq ft
So de Pfeffel wants to collapse house prices. Very brave.
Do you think high house prices are a good thing?
An increase in supply won't itself lead to a collapse in house prices, I wouldn't have thought, because it will happen gradually. All other things being equal (which they won't be), an increase in supply would lead to a gradual real terms reduction in house prices. Which would be a good thing.
I think we can generally agree that high house prices are bad but that house price collapses are bad. The only solution I see to this is gradual real terms reductions.
The key issue is, as touched on in that article, the proposed changes won't do much to bring house prices down or even slow their increase by much. It'll just piss off everyone affected, while enriching a handful of big developers (who will be the ones in full control over the supply and therefore in control over house prices).
One problem is the Politician's Syllogism: "Something must be done. This is something. It therefore must be done."
The suggestion in the article: "Planning reform, therefore, is largely irrelevant. A very different plan of action is required.
Firstly, the law should be used to exclude speculators from the housing market. We plan the location of new housing for environmental reasons and we should plan the ownership of new housing for social reasons. Most new houses should be reserved for first-time buyers and movers.
Free marketers might complain that this is distributism not capitalism. But so what? For a conservative, spreading home ownership should come before the purity of the market place.
On the supply side, government needs to break the big developers’ stranglehold on the land supply. It can do this by purchasing and preparing sites itself. A time-limited right to fully develop and sell-on plots could then be auctioned-off. Builders would thus be able to obtain the sites they need for houses they actually intend to build, but they’d have no need — nor the perverse incentive — to hold on to more land than that. "
... is key. And the planning reforms proposed won't do that. If anything, they'll move us further away from that. So we end up with no bringing down of house prices, poorly built rabbit hutches, big developers controlling the supply of housing, and really pissed off locals everywhere who are being completely ignored (get them involved and the problem really does reduce) and rapidly transition from dubious through NIMBY to BANANA.
Developers do not control the supply of land. They are usually just a convenient target who do not have votes.
That is done by local councils through the local plan development and zoning process. Landowners bring forward proposed sites (of which there are always more than needed), and teh Council rate them by their chosen criteria, make an ordered list and go down the list until their Housing Needs Assessment (which they also control) target has been met.
If the Council want more development land, they can allocate it.
The rub is that they often (as we have seen in C&A) do not want to do that, because their voters are self-serving Nimbys.
The article is weird - ill-informed, superficial, full of holes and impractical. I get the impression that he has never built anything other than with Lego.
On the proposal - why should the *Government* be the one buying plots. I thought the key objection was that the new proposal would take control AWAY from local communities. Give that power to the Local Authority, if someone must have it.
But it won't help, because it does not address the heart of the issue.
Developers do, however, have a huge interest in maintaining a tight grip on the supply of new houses in order to maximise their income. Most of the cost of a house is not in the house itself (in most parts of the coutry) but in the value of the land with planning permission underneath it.
My personal prediction is that local councils being forced to permit building will do little to nothing to promote house-building at the scale we need, because house builders don’t want to build at that rate - it lowers achievable prices whilst simultaneously driving up input costs (especially the labour cost of chippies, sparks etc etc).
In a free market developers can't refuse to build because if they do someone else will do the building instead and that someone else will make the profit instead.
The only way developers can refuse to build is if they have monopolistic powers, which doesn't happen in a free market because there's relatively low entry costs to this sector. The developers being the only ones who can navigate the planning system is what gives them monopolistic powers and why that doesn't exist in other nations with zonal planning where smaller developers or even self-building can exist instead.
As soon as they get the planning permission, there is no more free market. You can't roll up and build on a development site they've already got planning permission for. Even if they're building out really slowly.
A suggested fix -
If you apply for planning permission, you put the land into the agreement. If you get your planning permission and fail to build at an agreed rate - you lose the land.
"We've been delayed by x, y, z. We couldn't have anticipated [a pandemic/archeological discoveries/delays in receipt of building materials/staff illness/new legislation to comply with/unexpected birthday party] (delete as applicable). However, we have made a meaningful start as agreed."
Once a meaningful start has been made on a site, they're free and clear. I'd guess the original intent was to give them confidence that they won't have the rug pulled out from under them when buildings were half built. These days - well, I'm still a bit unsure about what "meaningful start" is supposed to mean; I've seen at least one site where I couldn't have told anything had happened. But they'd "made a meaningful start" so they were in the clear.
Charge Council Tax as if the house has been built from a particular point after permission is granted.
If they're tardy then hope they enjoy paying ~£1500 per house per year they're delayed by.
I’m on Holland and Denmark outright, for a reasonable stake. Both have shortened slightly since I backed them.
Both are in the nice side of the draw and should make it through to the quarters, where they face each other.
Do I let my bets run, or lay one, or both of them off?
Hmm.
I'm on Holland as well - pre-tournament at 20/1 - the logic was based on their draw. I'm letting it ride as I think they have a real chance of winning it.
Comments
Does it continue to go for the Islamic vote, knowing that to do so alienates it from many in the centre and even centre left
or
Does it veer away from that dependency, allowing the Tories to mop up Islamic votes from moderates and assimilators, and allowing Galloway and his lookalikes to form a religion based party founded on the mixed up left/Islamic flank both mopping up a few seats in Bethnal Green and Bradford and denying Labour a lot of votes.
What is odd is that a reputable poll recently showed Labour miles ahead of Galloway, while bookies/punters think this could easily be completely incorrect. How?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trade_route_from_the_Varangians_to_the_Greeks
One of our sites: thousands of houses, planning permission going through. Developer states "we will build out over 25 years".
I ask: "why so long?"
Them: "Market conditions."
[ie: we don't want to build out rapidly enough to bring prices down]
Should the reforms go through and big developers can just roll up with auto-approval on all large sites, they get the planning permission, it's their site, they build out at the speed they like.
The speed they like is the one that keeps cashflow coming in as long as possible without putting prices down.
They're fully aware of market forces; they aren't idiots. It's perfectly rational from their side.
(NB: Local Authorities don't control the number of houses they are deemed to need. They get to discuss and argue it, but that's imposed on them)
You can't roll up and build on a development site they've already got planning permission for. Even if they're building out really slowly.
https://twitter.com/johnstempinNPR/status/1407982165577584640
This doesn't mean that he's not making vast strides not seen by the poll last week, but it's a reason for caution in letting the state of the market decide your own position.
Developers will sell into the market, and there is a limit to how fast things sell - that is a dynamic of society not controlled by developers. London may be different in that respect due to people travelling past half a million houses to get to work - that is not how it works elsewhere. Talk to a normal sales office about a normal estate in a normal town and you will find that locals (within 10-15 miles) buy 80-90% of newbuild houses.
They will not build thousands and thousands of houses that will not sell yet because they remember what happened in 2009-2012, and as soon as you try to force the process into your favoured form that forces extra costs and reduces viability (which nobbles Planning Gain possible taxes), or raises prices.
Are you aware of any Government which has said "that's too many"?
If you fight dirty, then Galloway can certainly fight dirtier. And enjoy it.
There is too much money in the housing market from investors in buy-to-let and this does drive up prices. We need the economy to create better investment opportunities elsewhere.
We also have the boomer generation hanging on to their large family homes, while their children are squeezed into smaller properties with their families.
We could build more properties to solve that problem, I guess, or we could find ways to encourage people to downsize, or otherwise use the housing stock more efficiently.
A colleague (who is an active zoologist in his spare time) was very taken at having leeches applied to reduce the swelling caused by bleeding/bruising around his eye socket. I imagine he was one chap who didn't need as much persuasion as other patients.
Edit: this was in/near Edinburgh. Cutting edge innovation these days - wheel full circle and all that.
Nasmith swimming out to an expended torpedo, from his submarine, to disarm it and then reload it for another go.....
And this isn't my particular hobbyhorse, but there are significant downsides to being a car dependent society.
I would rather live in a house with a modest garden and little space to my neighbours and be within walking distance of a school, a pub, a shop, a cafe, a station, a town centre - than have a massive house and a massive garden but be a drive from any of these. And if I make the former decision, that enables four or five more people to do the same.
Granted there is room in the market for both options, and I wouldn't want to say no more big new new builds in peripheral locations. Indeed, it's possible to do big new new builds in peripheral locations very well (Woodford Garden Village springs to mind). But I think the high quality high density option (18 dwellings per acre and above) in a functioning neighbourhood is more generally attractive, and the low density option has significant externalities.
If you apply for planning permission, you put the land into the agreement.
If you get your planning permission and fail to build at an agreed rate - you lose the land.
He seems to me very similar to the Corbyn mode of thinking. The point of these "freedom" groups around the world was not so much the morality of their cause but the fact that they hated the west, a contempt that both Corbyn and Galloway seemed to share. His support for that murdering thug Saddam Hussein seemed to come from the same source. If he opposed the west that was good enough for George (even if he had been our willing tool against Iran).
I find it a little odd that @NickPalmer can think so highly of Corbyn and yet so little of Galloway. They are cut from the same cloth. They both start off from the premise that everything we do is wrong, everything is done in our self interest, that we are hypocritical about it and that our establishment is beneath contempt. There have clearly been times when this assessment was not that wide of the mark but personally as a default I find it comes pretty close to treason. I find it dismaying that he finds such a ready audience in a significant minority in this country. It suggests a degree of alienation that can only lead to trouble.
He, of course, will seek to exploit it rather than try to smooth the troubled waters. Where he is clearly even more morally reprehensible than Corbyn is that he has been very content to make money out of doing so. In fairness, not even Corbyn sought to do that.
This is a very useful guide to what different densities look like.
https://ggwash.org/view/74251/density-in-housing-looks-different-depending-on-where-you-are
Also it is simply wrong to take the price of larger houses as given. If you build more of them in places where people want to live, the price will fall. Then more people will be able to afford them. If you don't, the price will rise with incomes and they will continue to be unaffordable as the population grows. That's the truly bonkers policy.
That said, I would not have any scruples about a negative campaign in this case, since there's ample evidence to make it truthful, as Al says - that doesn't actually make it dirty. The question is simply what works. By now, all the leaflets will have been printed, so we just need to see what happens. AFAIK, Labour has gone for the "ignore him" approach. If I was running the campaign I'd go for one targeted leaflet to demolish him amid the more positive stuff.
Ronaldo top so far, of course, on 5 (4 penalties!).
No-one on 4.
I've looked at the four players currently on 3 goals to see if there is value.
Schick, Forsberg, Wijnaldum, Lukaku. Trad bookies go 25/1, 66/1, 20/1, 6/1 respectively.
Being in the bottom half of the draw seems a big advantage to me. That gives me Wijnaldum and Forsberg. I'm already on Wijnaldum up to my nads having backed him pre-tournament at 150 on the spreads and at 80/1 e/w with a bookie.
So that leave Forsberg (Sweden). He takes their penalties (big plus in this market - see Ronaldo), and Sweden is in the bottom half of the draw, playing Ukraine next. Top price with trad bookies is 66/1 but I just got 130 with BF.
Edit: worth pointing out that with the spreads this is a top goalscorer market not a Golden Boot market. Dead heat rules apply. None of this assist bollocks.
https://twitter.com/lookner/status/1408009976275214340
Rescuers in last 15 minutes - "we hear screaming"
Horrible, just horrible
He won 35% in Bethnal Green & Bow at the 2005 GE at the height of Iraq anger and in a even more favourable constituency than Batley & Spen.
He won 55% at Bradford West, also corralling the WWC vote.
He has had various small shares since.
He shed large portions of those votes at subsequent elections, but that is perhaps by-the-by.
I think both of the above were free hits, despite only one being a by-election. I also don't think he can carry that much of the WWC vote - many will generally know enough that he goes on incessantly about the Middle East in an era when Corbyn has made that toxic, why not just plump for the Tory if you want to kick Starmer.
So, I think his core vote this time will heavily tend to a section of the Muslim community and in B&S there is an upper limit to that, even if he does capture the imagination. I think his absolute ceiling if his campaign catches fire again is about 20%, but realistically hitting the 10-15% range would be a good result for him.
It would sink Labour, for sure, in fact I increasingly think Labour are sunk in B&S already and it'll be around a 4-5% Tory majority. That's from neck and neck a week ago. But Galloway in second - still probably not.
Regardless of his true level of support in the constituency, if people think he's doing well then enough of them might believe he's the best option to defeat the Tories to make it true.
Tories struggling to keep a straight face, of course.
Edit: I guess one question is to what extent his candidature exists on the ground in the constituency. Does he have a group of volunteers who can put the legwork in, or is it all at a community leaders/local paper sort of level?
I have fished out he book I had idn mind and it is in fact Dardanelles Patrol by Shankland and Hunter - one of those war paperbacks so common when we were weans and callants. About (the real) Naismith and E.11. But no less ripping a yarn for not being fiction.
I personally have a general sympathy with much of their views being socially liberal myself but as social attitudes seem to take over from economic issues Labour face a world of pain outside their University/metropolitan strongholds.
The only thing the leadership can hope for is that dislike of the other side trumps the dislike of other parts of the coalition. It may work, but it's not a recipe for harmonious politics.
So they want freedom of movement but not more housing.
They want more public transport but not HS2
They want more public spending on just about everything but lower taxes (if fairness they are very far from alone in this).
High death toll, I recon.
Awful
"That's a matter for individual countries to decide their own policies as we do ours. We will continue to speak to our European partners about the reopening of travel in a safe and secure way."
https://twitter.com/pippacrerar/status/1408025586912706561?s=21
They’ve also kept their cool over Breton’s “obey or we’ll kill your citizens”…
Haven't heard of imams on side - his alliance is with several dissident local councillors, no?
According to Labour reports from the ground, he is having an impact (hard to be sure how much) but only in two wards. In particular, he seems to be entirely absent from Spen (which IIRC the Survation poll also suggested). I do agree that his impact could well lose Labour the seat.
The solution, if not an entirely palatable one, is to find a personality who appeals across different types of people even if they wouldn't really agree with their detailed views. Johnson reaches out by hearty cheeriness, Blair did it by can-do charisma. Common to both is a sense of optimism - people are drawn to leaders who tell them that a better future is available, "just over there if you follow me"... Those of us are really into political detail tend to underestimate that kind of appeal. And despite what I've said I do worry that Galloway has a bit of it too.
And nobody (apart from GG) can want that, surely.
The city of York is aligned in some way with the West Yorkshire Combined Authority, and is accessing funding from it (https://www.westyorks-ca.gov.uk/projects/housing-and-regeneration/york-central/) but the areas outside York refused to do the same.
Hopefully he isn’t having too much of an impact, it’s not good to see his divisive style of politics succeeding.
But that has the obvious problem that governing coalitions are formed between parties, rather than within them, which is not obviously better and arguably worse.
I’m on Holland and Denmark outright, for a reasonable stake. Both have shortened slightly since I backed them.
Both are in the nice side of the draw and should make it through to the quarters, where they face each other.
Do I let my bets run, or lay one, or both of them off?
Hmm.
Ms Cherry has accepted instructions through Beltrami and Company to defend Ms Millar, who has been charged by police with offences under s.127 of the Communications Act 2003 over her social media activity in 2019.
Ms Millar, an accountant, had retweeted an image of a bow of ribbons in the Suffragette colours of green, white and purple that was tied around a tree outside of the Glasgow studio in which a BBC soap opera was being filmed.
The police received a complaint about the image on the basis the ribbons represented a noose. The nature of other complaints made against Ms Millar is unknown.
https://www.scottishlegal.com/article/exclusive-joanna-cherry-qc-to-defend-marion-millar-in-limited-return-to-the-bar
This will majorly trigger (some of) the Greens...
https://twitter.com/RudyTomarchio/status/1408038820361158659?s=20
Images from Google Street View show that the concrete was in a poor state, which might not be a surprise given it faces the sea, and storms throwing up salt are frequent.
Another failure of building inspectors (or the lack of them). More Ponte Morandi than Grenfell, I think, although of course we had a similar collapse (due to a gas explosion) in Newham in the 1960s.
However, we have made a meaningful start as agreed."
Once a meaningful start has been made on a site, they're free and clear. I'd guess the original intent was to give them confidence that they won't have the rug pulled out from under them when buildings were half built. These days - well, I'm still a bit unsure about what "meaningful start" is supposed to mean; I've seen at least one site where I couldn't have told anything had happened. But they'd "made a meaningful start" so they were in the clear.
It looks horribly like she’s been charged because of who she is, rather than what she did. How is retweeting a photo of some ribbons a criminal offence, if the original post isn’t, and neither is putting the ribbons there in the first place?
UK a really needs a First Amendment.
https://www.betfair.com/exchange/plus/politics/market/1.183248116
Currently they can get permission for thousands of homes and then that's that and nobody else gets permission (since thousands have been approved) and they're a monopoly provider.
But if there's zonal planning so that permission doesn't need to be gained thousands at a time then unless the developer buys the entire zone if they buy some of it and plan to develop it slowly, someone else can buy another bit of the zone and develop that instead.
Indeed liberate the market enough and instead of developers with thousands of homes, you can break it down to people building just one house at a time.
The whole point of properly liberalising the market properly isn't to build over everything green (nobody wants that nor is there demand for that), but to break away the anticompetitive practices that planning creates.
That is partly through the intensive individual feedback on house by house applications which is possible (which drives many self-builders spare).
I think we often underestimate the extent to which land scarcity and intensive use impacts on planning - our property laws going back centuries are shot through with the assumption that using all the land is important. One example is the possibility of adverse possession just because no one else is using a piece of land.
Hypothetically i you build in a town a thousand luxury homes that can only be bought by the well off then what happens? The well off buy their new homes, move out, sell their old homes and someone else can buy the old homes.
That's the whole notion of chains and ladders that exists throughout the market.
You don't need to keep shovelling more s**t boxes at the bottom of the market.
1. Trans activism versus "traditional" feminism.
2. Racial identity politics versus traditional socialism and class based politics.
3. Feminism, anti-racism, gay rights versus conservative Islam.
4. Palestine as a hot button acts as gateway drug to anti-semitism and drives off many voters, WWC and non-Moslem ethnic minorities.
5. All identity politics versus diminishing but still significant working class vote.
That's not to mention other challenges like residual Remain versus Brexit and economic policy which also challenge the Tories of course. Probably the Tories will be more pragmatic even on those topics if they need to be..
If they're tardy then hope they enjoy paying ~£1500 per house per year they're delayed by.