In order to solve the housing crisis we need to make better use of existing urban housing and build more within existing cities. However, Labour’s plans to build on the green belt must also be part of the solution and the only way to reach Net Zero targets, argues Ben Ramanauskas.

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As an adviser to the former government, it may seem odd for me to jump to the defence of the current government’s policy proposals. However, I do wish to politely disagree with a post by Professor Anne Power criticising Labour’s housing plans. 

Professor Power is correct to highlight the fact that the UK is facing two major crises, a housing one and an environmental one. The housing crisis is driving homelessness, plunging households into poverty, hampering the prospects of young people, and causing a great deal of economic damage. Moreover, the environmental crisis poses an existential risk to humans and other animals and risks causing even more damage to the country’s economy and the way of life of its people. Both crises need urgent attention.

We should be building dense and walkable cities where people are not reliant on cars and can thereby utilise many of the benefits of this.

However, while Professor Power is right to highlight these crises and the need for workable policy solutions, she is simultaneously too optimistic about the alternative solutions she offers to the housing crisis and too pessimistic about Labour’s plans.

Cities have to be part of solving the housing crisis

Let us start with Professor Power’s proposals. I found myself agreeing with many of them, especially where they state that densifying our cities should be a priority. This is right. We should be building dense and walkable cities where people are not reliant on cars and can thereby utilise many of the benefits of this. Densifying the major cities of the UK would bring numerous benefits such as reducing the need for people to damage the environment by making long journeys by car by allowing them to use more environmentally friendly forms of transport or to walk and cycle if they are able, which would be good for their health. 

There is a case to be made that we should simply scrap stamp duty altogether given that it gums up the housing market by acting as a disincentive for households to downsize.

It would also be a huge boost to the UK economy due to the agglomeration effects of having many people living and working in close proximity to each other. This would be especially true of our major cities such as London, Oxford, Manchester, Birmingham, and why there is reason to be very optimistic about Labour’s commitment to follow through with the plan to allow further development in Cambridge. This would help to increase the country’s stagnant productivity growth and boost the economy.

Professor Power is also right to point out that we should focus on densifying cities rather than simply building lots of new towns in random places around the country. These likely would be lacking the infrastructure needed to connect people with jobs and amenities and so would be economically inefficient and risk resources being wasted and causing further damage to the environment. It would also risk forgetting the lessons of history. The Labour government led by Harold Wilson prioritised towns at the expense of cities such as Birmingham and failed to achieve the economic gains he had hoped for all while causing immense damage to Birmingham. Allowing greater development in cities has spillover effects which benefit neighbouring towns and villages and so help to drive economic growth in those regions.

Moreover, Professor Power is correct to say that some households should be encouraged to downsize and to suggest a stamp duty exemption as an incentive. There is a case to be made that we should be even bolder here and simply scrap stamp duty altogether given that it gums up the housing market by acting as a disincentive for households to downsize and is causing a great deal of harm to the economy. What is more, the government could implement a Land Value Tax to ensure that available land is used in the most economically efficient and environmentally friendly way possible.

Despite there being much I agree with in Professor Power’s piece, a case could be made that they are being too optimistic about these plans alone solving the housing and environmental crises. 

The simple truth is that the country has failed to build enough new homes to meet demand.

More urban housing is neither easy nor compatible with net zero

The housing crisis is fundamentally one of supply and demand – a point which I feel that Professor Power does appreciate – and the simple truth is that the country has failed to build enough new homes to meet demand. Despite the demand for housing, new supply has been constricted by the UK’s planning system and this has been the key driver of the housing crisis. As such, housing has become increasingly unaffordable and so just focussing on scraps of land within cities or hoping to coax households into smaller properties is unlikely to boost supply to a significant extent and so would be insufficient to tackle the housing crisis.

Furthermore, if the UK is to meet its Net Zero target and help to tackle the climate crisis, then it is going to need to build more wind turbines, pylons, solar farms, and nuclear power stations. Some of these can be built within cities and many of them obviously do need to be close to cities, but constraints on space and objections from residents mean that this will just not be feasible in many cases. Again, this means that going for density alone is unlikely to tackle the climate crisis.

While striving towards densification of cities would be preferable, responsibly developing on parts of the green belt would allow the country to build the homes it needs to tackle the housing crisis.

The green belt must be part of solving the housing crisis

This is where there is a case to be made that Professor Power is being too pessimistic about Labour’s plans. These plans involve freeing up parts of the green belt for development. While it would certainly be inappropriate to develop on many parts of the green belt due to the impact it might have on the environment, it does need to be remembered that a considerable proportion of land designated as green belt is of no environmental or agricultural value. It also offers little benefit to ordinary members of the public – in fact over seven per cent of green belt land surrounding London are golf courses. While striving towards densification of cities would be preferable, responsibly developing on parts of the green belt would allow the country to build the homes it needs to tackle the housing crisis.

Are Labour’s plans perfect? No. However, we should not let perfect be the enemy of the good.

Finally, as discussed above, ending the energy crisis will mean building clean energy and transport infrastructure. This will require space and, in many cases, will need to be away from built up populations. Again, allowing development on parts of the green belt for this purpose will allow the new government to significantly reduce emissions.

Are Labour’s plans perfect? No. However, we should not let perfect be the enemy of the good. If policymakers are serious about ending the housing and environmental crises then they should embrace plans to free up green belt land for development while also pushing for greater densification so that as many new homes and public transport and sustainable energy infrastructure as possible can be built in and around the UK’s major cities.

All articles posted on this blog give the views of the author(s), and not the position of LSE British Politics and Policy, nor of the London School of Economics and Political Science.

Image credit: Irene Miller in Shutterstock

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