More planning whack-a-mole
Writing in the April/ May issue of PHPD, Editor Johnny Dobbyn considers the Government’s latest wheeze when it comes to not dealing with the housing crisis.
It is easy to suspect that, when it comes to housing, the Government either just doesn’t get it or has deliberately set out to make it life as difficult as possible for sole traders and SMEs.
This is shown in the latest wheeze from the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC). Having wrecked buy-to-let for private investors in favour of the corporates, the DLUHC is now trying to kill the domestic holiday sector with a consultation suggesting that short-term lets will need planning permission in the future.
Now the holiday business is not really our concern, but the consultation is indicative of this Government’s whack-a-mole approach to solving the housing crisis, which is to do anything – scapegoating second home and holiday let owners in this instance – other than face the facts about supply, demand and delivery.
One understands how popular holiday destinations at the seaside and in the country have a beef with emmets, blown-ins and grockles hollowing out their centres, leaving the towns dark in winter and the remaining locals largely dependent on tourism and hospitality for work.
But punishing second home owners and holiday letters with multiples of council tax, planning permission and letting registers won’t solve the deeper seated problem of insufficient housing for a burgeoning population.
You could put every holiday let in Salcombe, Britain’s most expensive seaside resort, back on the market today and the people that can’t afford them now wouldn’t be able to afford them then.
St Ives in Cornwall found out the hard way when it decided that new build housing had to be for full-time occupation. As a result, it’s said the number of new builds has dropped as their viability reduced in a ‘locals only’ market and existing properties have become even more expensive as the supply shortened.
This is not to mention the hypocrisy shown by those with a foothold in these areas (Clarkson’s Farm anyone?), who then try to pull the ladder up, vociferously objecting to new developments, especially those of an affordable or social nature, while their neighbours’ children move away.
Unfortunately, it appears to be this NIMBY cohort – which believes the only land that should be built on is the land upon which their houses stand – to which Gove and his pals are in thrall, refusing to consider any practical root and branch reform of planning, while moving away meaningful targets based on need; while they can pointlessly whack-a-mole instead.
