Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government

Andrew George Excerpts

Tuesday 24th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Andrew George (St Ives) (LD)]

I warmly congratulate the hon. Member for Vauxhall and Camberwell Green (Florence Eshalomi) on the way in which she introduced the debate, and I strongly support everything she said. Indeed, I support the sentiment and ambition of the Government’s announcement of £39 billion in investment. However, the Government must listen to local areas and, if they are intent on delivering their housing targets, must allow those areas to vary the way in which the targets are met.

I will cite the example of my area of Cornwall. It is one of the fastest-growing places in the United Kingdom, almost trebling its housing stock over the past 60 years, but the housing problems of local people have got significantly worse over that period. That does not mean that the answer is building fewer homes; it simply means that the target-setting process is not in itself the solution to the housing problems that such places face. These targets are often based on the delusion that the private market will collude with the Government in driving down the price of its finished product, which is clearly not the case. The Government need to allow that in some places, areas can set targets to meet need. That would mean that planning applicants had to demonstrate how they would meet need, rather than simply building homes that people cannot afford. That is a method that the Government need to consider.

Far too much of what goes into the planning system is about land value speculators taking far too much out of the development process. Setting high housing targets creates high hope value on all the land adjoining all our communities. It is like applying the rural exceptions policy, but around all our areas. We need to address the issues more effectively. The Government need to recognise that many shovel-ready projects are currently unviable, so when money is being considered for future housing projects, they need to look carefully at how they can get things moving very quickly.

In Cornwall, over the past decade, £500 million of taxpayers’ money has gone into the pockets of second and holiday homeowners, because tax incentives and loopholes support that. I urge the Government to look again at wider questions of housing injustice, and at the way that houses are being misdelivered in areas like mine, and to try to work with local communities and the council to ensure that we meet need, rather than developers’ greed.