The disastrous LBC interview changes nothing - we need to turn the heat back on the government that caused the housing crisis
Natalie Bennett should have been better prepared. That’s really all there is to take from her interview with LBC yesterday, in which she crumbled under scrutiny of her housing policies. It’s not that the whole Green Party is discredited, or that she is stupid, or that she has her sights set on ‘the economy being wrecked and much-loved traditions destroyed’.
We need a bit of perspective. The Greens have some bad policies and some good ones; as Zoe Williams writes in the Guardian today, Bennett’s main mistake was in trying to answer a question rather than describe her vision. Most politicians skirt around the questions they are asked in interviews, instead reiterating the part they are proudest of again and again. It is certainly not uncommon for interviewers to be unable to get hard figures out of their subjects.
The difference is that normally these evasions are delivered smoothly, and most speakers have been extensively polished by PR teams so that they know not to incriminate themselves with coughs and pauses. Natalie Bennett somehow missed this training and she’s paying the price in jeers from all sides.
But voters should not let the circus distract them from housing policies that desperately need changing.The Conservatives have many policies and plans for housing which ought to be bigger news than the Green leader forgetting her figures.
For example, the vacant building credit that the government introduced in December 2014, exempts any housing developer who turns an empty building into private housing from paying to build further affordable units. So even if the developer is making good profits, they do not have to contribute to affordable housing.
Super-rich investors will profit from the change; among the first to do so are the redevelopers of an apartment block in Mayfair that was bought in 2013 by Abu Dhabi’s investment fund.
And what about Iain Duncan Smith’s plans to ‘gift’ recent benefit claimants with council house as a reward for being in work for one year? There are around 1.7 million people on the social housing waiting list. These are all people badly in need of a home. IDS’s proposal not only lets these people down, but it assumes that unemployed people choose to be so, and that all they need is a financial incentive to get back to work – as if the promise of a steady income and not having to use food banks was not enough.
There is also David Cameron’s proposal to scrap housing benefit for school leavers in a misguided attempt to improve the work ethic of young people. Again, this proposal overlooks all the complex economic reasons people are out of work and assumes the unemployed just can’t be bothered. Anger about this policy came even from within the prime minister’s own party – Health Committee chair Sarah Wollaston told the BBC:
“I would not support personally taking housing benefit from the most vulnerable. I would not personally support taking away housing benefit from the very young.”
House building is also at its lowest level since 1924. Since the last election, an average of just 201 social and affordable homes have been built in each Conservative-held local authority, according to research obtained by Shadow Local Government secretary Hilary Benn, compared with 403 in Labour-held councils.
In London the problem is especially bad, despite the capital’s growing population. According to the last census, London needs at least 40,000 new homes every year just to keep up with this growth, yet in 2010/11 less than half of that number were built.
All over the country people are finding it harder than ever for people to pay their rents, and home ownership is a laughable dream for a whole generation. Worse, homelessness charity Shelter reports that the number of homeless children is at a three-year high. So let’s take the heat off the Green leader for a second and start holding the government who have actually caused these problems to account.
Natalie Bennett apologised for her interview which, to be fair, hasn’t actually hurt anybody. The same cannot be said of the Conservatives, or of the policies they have introduced.
Ruby Stockham is a staff writer at Left Foot Forward. Follow her on Twitter
112 Responses to “Forget Natalie Bennett’s interview from hell, here’s the real problem with housing”
The Orbital Garden
I can see that their will be no convincing you that more housing will reduce it costs, as long it is within a reason commute.
However for those intrested in resolving the crisis; here is a report on how to create small communities on farmland. The value on the housing is much higher when around London. Due to higher value of houses which will be able to provide at lot more for a nfrastructure.
http://www.policyexchange.org.uk/publications/category/item/garden-villages-empowering-localism-to-solve-the-housing-crisis
Guest
Two+ hour commutes on a bus are not “reasonable”. Neither is forcing people to travel that sort of distance to go to large shops or to go to school.
And you keep talking about your Mansions on farmland, as you praise your profits, and how you’ll be able to provide plenty of security fences to keep the people away from the rich who you want to have new housing.
Anything but allow house building for the 99%, on land banks and brownfield land, in reach of the jobs you hate so much, without forcing some parents to stop eating to send their kids long-distance to school at great expense, etc.
That article is not proposing anything like your idea of single-mansions. Or your proposal to seize land for cheap for them. It is still from a right wing think tank, of course, dedicated to abolishing any right of appeal against housing developments and committed to eradicating green belts.
The Orbital Garden
I have not preposed mansions, security fenses, two hour commutes on busses, subsidies, or anyone being forced to stop eating.
I have simply proposed a series of villages within farmland on the greenbelt. The cost of the farm land is so low and housing cost so high that you can pay for all rail and infrastructure costs without subsidies.
Each of these villages will be like the ones proposed (and costed) in policy exchange document.
The idea of building on the greenbelt is obviously so frightening to others that they will try to claim all sorts untrue statements. The idea that building enough homes to end a housing crisis and releave poverty obviously is offensive.
Unless we wake up to the fact the parties are more interested in protecting their local supporters grass roots. They will say lots of nice words but when you look into the detail it amounts to little. We need to ensure their policies are checked to really do as their reteric says and hold them to account for the policies long term effects.
For example labour (and greens) are targeting 200,000 new homes, 45,000 homes less than the number of new homes required. This lack of supply will push up rents even further.
The liberal democrates are targeting 300,000 which is enought per year but due to fails of several decades will take until the 1930s to resolve the crisis. They know this but its easier to deliver and means they can avoid the real difficult decisions.
All conservative housing policies look like they are actually green belt protection policies; each announcement includes the statement on brownflied only. For example Tax discounts for the under 40 but only on a few selected brownfield unpopular sites.
The Orbital Garden
If you are interest in what my opions actually are you can read them on the website below. Some statements may be controversial and only apply in the context of a garden city, areas when planning gain is gathered in another way to allow the flooding of the property market without making builders bankrupt; So I expect to misquoted or out of context in the reply.
http://sites.google.com/site/orbitalgarden/
Kevin Stall
Who is dishing out the money to build? Social housing cost money. And if you set minimum sizes per children what do you do when the children are grown and gone? Force them out? Or when a union or politicians making £150,000 per year. Is social housing for life or for those that need it? You need to decide.