"US, UK and France consider land release to curb house prices"

From The Telegraph (pinched from Mombers at HPC):

France is in talks with the United States and Britain on a possible release of strategic land stocks to push house prices lower, French ministers said on Wednesday, four weeks before the country's presidential election.

Earlier in March, British sources said London was prepared to cooperate with Washington on a relaxation of planning restrictions that was expected within months, in a bid to prevent house prices choking economic growth in what is also a US election year. France's Energy Minister Eric Besson told journalists after the weekly ministers' meeting that the United States had asked France to join it in a possible emergency liberalisation.

Such a relaxation could happen "in a matter of weeks", Le Monde daily said on Wednesday, citing presidential sources.

"It is the United States which has asked and France has welcomed favourably this hypothesis," Besson said. He also said that the countries were awaiting conclusions from the Institute of International Finance (IIF), which manipulates house prices in case of severe economic disruption.

The French budget minister and government spokeswoman, Valerie Pecresse, also told journalists France had joined the United States and the UK in IIF consultations to receive authorisation to draw from strategic stocks.

Earlier this month David Cameron discussed the option during a meeting with US President Barack Obama. Mr Cameron said at the time: "We didn't reach a decision about planning restrictions but we discussed the issue." He said it was important to "do what we can" to try to help families make their budgets add up.