Housing hypocrisy

Published: 19 August, 2010

• HOUSING minister Grant Shapps is on record for saying that “…house building has been declining over the past few years and is at its lowest peacetime level since 1924. Taking action to address this is a priority for government. That’s why I have announced that the New Homes Bonus will be introduced early in the spending review period”.

The word hypocrisy comes to mind. What has his party done to help the housing crisis? 

There seems to be a propaganda drive from the government suggesting the word “renting” is dirty. Why are they obsessed with saddling people with negative equity mortgages, skewing the market, ending up with taxpayers coming to the rescue?

In Germany, there are more renting options and standards are higher than Britain and 49 per cent in the population rents. The figure is 34 in France, 32 in the Netherlands, but only 26 per cent of the population in rental accommodation here.

We need up to 300,000 new houses per year for the next 10 years in order to redress the housing crisis and neither warm words nor the private market has a proven track record or the capacity to deliver this challenge in a Tory cuts culture. 
Cllr Meric Apak
Chair of Housing Scrutiny Committee