Neverending Tory

7 October 2015 By George Hay Follow @gfhay

David Cameron promises 200,000 affordable “starter homes” by 2020. Even if the Conservative prime minister delivers, the supply squeeze is set to worsen, pushing house prices even higher. Like the previous Help to Buy ruse, a few people will gain, but the whole nation loses.

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Council targets for private developers to include a certain percentage of cheap rented accommodation in their schemes are to be scrapped, the UK government announced on Oct. 7. Instead, developers will be able to sell homes at a 20 percent discount to their market value.

The government hopes to build 200,000 of these “starter homes” by 2020.

Shelter, the housing lobby group, said the policy was attempting to solve an affordability crisis by getting rid of the few affordable homes the UK is building.

“Today’s announcement confirms our fears that Starter Homes costing up to 450,000 pounds will be built at the expense of the genuinely affordable homes this country desperately needs,” Shelter said. “Our research has shown that these Starter Homes will too often only be ‘affordable’ for higher earners, not the millions of people working hard for an average wage who will be left stuck in expensive private renting.

“There’s nothing wrong with helping people on to the property ladder, but the government has to invest in genuinely affordable homes to buy and rent for all of those on ordinary incomes who are bearing the brunt of this crisis.”

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