Robin Smith left this comment on my recent post Ugly reality starting to bite Home-Owner-Ists in the arse":
... Recently I've been told that councillors in a several authorities have been intimidated into approving planning applications against the wishes of their constituents by more senior members. This appears common and I'm not hunting for the data. I'm being approached directly by scared politicians.
The developers are now so powerful they basically command the planning authority via threats of expensive appeals. Proof of this is abundant, in fact. The latest is that members [of the planning authority] are now deferring to "the best lawyers" to make planning decisions for fear of the more expensive developer lawyers. The planing authorities are no longer in control of what goes on.
The NIMBY's really do not have a say in it that matters. They may be able to do enough to get the peasants on the poor side of town to take the development but this power too is falling away lately.
1. As far as I see it, home-builders are there to meet demand, which the government, under the influence of the NIMBYs does its best to restrict. The fact that vacant property is taxed so lightly (so there is little economic incentive to bring it back into use) exacerbates this, of course.
2. OK. Just imagine that was such a thing as Car-Owner-Ism, analogous to Home-Owner-Ism, whereby existing car owners put huge pressure on the government to restrict, if not ban outright, the production of new cars in the UK, so that existing car owners can benefit from much higher resale values and can have more of the road to themselves; maybe they'd ask for fuel duties and car tax to be abolished and even ask for subsidies to 'bring derelict cars back into use' and a very generous scrappage scheme to underwrite values of cars that are effectively write-offs...
3. Such a massive infringement in the free markets might lead to the UK car industry shutting down completely, but don't you think that European and Japanese carmakers, seeing all this 'pent-up demand' would not lobby intensively for import quotas to be lifted and offer UK politicians all manner of inducements and subject them to all sorts of pressure?
4. Or take the Prohibition in the USA, did this not strengthen the position of those who were determined to sell alcohol anyway, which in turn leads to corruption of politicians, as well as massively pushing up the prices that the otherwise law-abiding citizen had to pay for a drink?
5. Summa summarum, if we liberalised planning laws (in terms of quantity) while maybe tightening up a bit on actual building standards (heat and sound insulation, electrical safety etc), there simply wouldn't be a developers' lobby, they wouldn't have these huge budgets to devote to putting pressure on members of planning committees; there's no need to kick down an open door.
6. I'm still waiting for the day when constituents, instead of resolutely opposing any new construction are actually campaigning for more homes to be built so that their adult children can finally afford to buy a home and start a family. But I'm not holding my breath on that one.
Tuesday, 16 March 2010
Can we stop bashing the developers, please?
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7 comments:
I entirely agree mark. Restrictive planning laws are just a burden and cost our society does not need.
Anything that can be done to reduce spend with lawyers MUSt be a good thing, by definition.
I'm not sure if you have seen the point I made here:
Ugly reality starting to bite Home-Owner-Ists in the arse: http://markwadsworth.blogspot.com/2010/03/ugly-reality-starting-to-bite-home.html
Enough housing already gets built and is already built. NIMBY's just get it moved as far from them as possible.
1) On "demand" how can there be a real demand when the developer is calling the larger number of shots ? The only demand is for the housing the developer wants to build at the cheapest price and then walk away with all the planning gain. This is called a monopoly position. We get shit and have to live in it. No one else is building non-shit. That is not demand. That is monopoly power
2) Cars are consumed wealth. Land is not wealth. It is neither consumed nor made. Surprised at you here! A classic mistake in the false battle between labour and capital. Do me a comparison with say another natural opportunity such as fossil fuels and I'll think about it.
5 Yes lets have a free market for housing. Single Tax would do that.
6. But do we actually need more homes as you state above? We need to free up the existing ones being kept out of use (about a million at the last count) Single tax would do it.
"The developers are now so powerful they basically command the planning authority via threats of expensive appeals."
I read this to mean that smaller companies are being refused planning permission they should legally be allowed, because they can't afford the expensive appeals process.
just me?
Anonymous: pretty much, though smaller developers (usually those who actually hang around after building) do not have the same commitments to infrastructure. (I think under 3 dwellings(used to be 15 I think)) so it balances out a tiny bit there. but the middling co's are screwed and they are the ones that build the best homes(usually) What a shame.
Both small and large "release" the increased community created value in the land, only when they fully provide the funds for the extra infrastructure required. (short of an LVT)
This never ever happens though. This is why we have NIMBY's. They are right to the extent the value released is being taken away again. Wrong in MW's terms because they implicitly support the very thing they shout against.
I remember (late 90's?) when the government was bullying the local authorities into approving a minimum number of new homes every year, which led to all sorts of corruption, but, AFAICR, did bugger all to the price of housing.
One of the main problems with the current system is that the local authorities' "planning" departments do very little actual planning. They, and to a much larger extent, local residents have very little say in where new housing is proposed, they are almost invariably presented with a "take it or leave it" choice of a development on a piece of land which has been chosen for development for the sole reason that it belongs to a developer. Faced with such powerlessness, it is hardly surprising that most people's reaction is obstruction.
bayard: That is exactly right and still goes on today. Its labour policy. And my point much better made thanks!
What happened specifically in the 90's with respect to corruption ?
@RS Well, nothing out of the ordinary, really, when you're dealing with permission for multi-million pound housing developments. The sort of thing that always goes on when public decision leads to private gain. That's why I think their should be a 95% Property class use change tax payable on the sale of the property.
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