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Rishi Sunak has won the Conservative leadership campaign and is set to become Prime Minister tomorrow.
Over the summer Sunak set out his broad housing policies in the lengthy series of hustings and media interviews held with the then-Tory leadership rival Liz Truss.
Throughout the Boris Johnson-led government of 2019 to mid-2022 Sunak fell in line over the Renters Reform Bill and Fairer Private Rented Sector White Paper; he made few comments explicitly about landlords or tenants, save to support the general thrust of recent reforms and also backing the successive eviction bans during the Covid period.
It is expected that he will continue with the long-standing Conservative commitment to scrap Section 21 powers.
In August Sunak said he wanted today’s renters, along with young adults obliged to live at home with their parents, to become capitalists - and that meant getting their hands on capital in the form of home ownership.
He told Sky News in one interview: “We are the standard bearers for capitalism. But we can't expect future generations to share our belief in capitalism if they can't get their hands on capital. That's why I'll do whatever it takes to build affordable, plentiful housing, building the next generation of Conservative voters.”
More broadly on housing, the former Chancellor said he wanted developers to finish a project before they are granted new planning permission for other plots in the same local area, while local authorities having greater compulsory purchase powers to buy undeveloped land at a discount if it has not been built on within an agreed time frame.
To avoid existing communities having too many new homes without appropriate local facilities, he also pledged a new 'infrastructure first guarantee', which aims to ensure all new homes are supported by enough local doctors, schools and roads.
Sunak’s most explicit expression of housing policies was set out in a written response to questions from the Housing Today publication.
In that response he said he was against the previous Tory manifesto commitment to build 300,000 homes a year in England, because he now rejected “arbitrary top-down numbers”.
Instead his team said: “Rishi does not believe in arbitrary, top down numbers. What matters is helping councils to get local plans in place more quickly to deliver beautiful homes, which communities can support.”
The statement added Sunak wanted to introduce reforms to tackle landbanking, remove barriers for small builders and deliver more homes through modern methods of construction. He also plans to implement a “balanced approach” to planning fees, which his team said will provide funding certainly for planning departments but also not “place disproportionate burdens on smaller developers”.
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I don’t hold out much hope, landlords will never be flavour of the month.
If he only listens to the activists and ignores landlords, then he will preside over a massive surge in homelessness.
He wants family members to live at home with their parents, is this a cultural thing with some communities, you’ll be busy keeping today’s generation at home for sure. Still it one way of avoiding the licensing Schemes I wonder who wrote it.
Of course he wants people to be home owners. It means they don't qualify for LHA.
They're hardly going to be getting their hands on capital in the form of home ownership when property prices drop due to the Bank of England increasing interest rates. Negative equity is far more likely.
His idea of wanting developers to finish a project before they are granted new planning permission for other plots in the same local area shows just how clueless he is about housing. It can take years to acquire suitable land and get planning permission granted. Local Authorities work on 10 or 20 year town planning concepts. It could turn into 40 or 50 year concepts if developers had to finish one development before starting the next. If mortgage lenders aren't willing to lend or people aren't willing to risk taking out a big mortgage how are developers supposed to sell houses?
His 'infrastructure first guarantee', which aims to ensure all new homes are supported by enough local doctors, schools and roads is a soundbite with very little likelihood of being financially viable. How are doctors and schools going to justify their existence with no patients or pupils? Busing them in from outside the area is the usual method but then there is no capacity for anyone who buys or rents the new houses when they are actually built. Does he not realise it takes years to build a housing estate not just a few minutes?
They can build new schools and GP surgeries but how are they going to staff them, good GPs are like hens teeth , and teaching is a dead end job with lots of teachers leaving to find better jobs
Hardly old enough to understand I was a landlord before he was born, they tell me its nothing to do with it, they know everything now. I would love to see them to have started from my starting Point.
He has only been in parliament for a few years and is highly inexperienced. It's like giving the managing directors job of a large company to someone who has just finished his apprenticeship! As a chancellor he squandered billions on test and trace, bounceback loans and medical protective clothing.
I would rather have a 42 year old who's only spent the last few years in Parliament than a 60 year old that's been there for 40 years.
I would ban entry to Parliament for those under 40 and demand they had held down real world jobs for at least 20 years before being able to stand for Parliament.
At least he's had a successful career before becoming an MP, unlike many who've never worked outside the Westminster bubble.
A lot of the mismanagement of contracts is down to Civil Service inefficiency with many of the senior bureaucrats also never having worked in the real world.
20 years involved in property and not a Chemist making rules for Private Property owners.
Robert what successful career did Signal have ,? He will be a disaster. I give him 12 months.
Although he married an heiress, he had made millions in his career with Goldman Sachs.
It might not be as real world as running a factory but it beats leaving Oxford at 21 and spending a few years on an MP's staff before getting a safe seat.
Robert, as GB news pointed out last night, nobody knows how he got his money. He's certainly been very good at wrecking the economy and has the effontery to blame liz truss for it.
I agree about Liz Truss No doubt she listened to her advisors in the Civil Service The unaccountable !!
Yes real jobs in a Real-world for all MPs's not either a job in daddy's firm
Ans about Civil Service inefficiency they are only there for self-interest and preserving the status quo I used to love Yes Minster and Yes prime minister with the civil service running the country and a figurehead who moved on from post to post who had no idea what was happening
Council’s. MP’s & Mayors know nothing about real World jobs.
The way London is run is a disaster. Traffic jambs deliberately caused all over the place, temporary lights and restrictions rampant when they are not needed and no one working there its madness.
It rained last night flooding and ponding everywhere, no leaves were swept left to rot down and turn into soil blocking up gulley’s & the drainage system.
I have seen about 30
Ponds today on my travels including Lake Superior on the A 40 flyover. Costing Billions in Road Repair’s, again & again how stupid is that. They talk and use Health & Safety as an excuse for everything but they are are clueless idiots. I think they should do their own jobs that they should be doing instead of targeting Private landlords wrecking PRS & the Economy causing Homeless.
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