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From yesterday's Evening Standard (page 41, top left): Don't blame the planners for the lack of land for housing in London (July 26). There is enough land with planning permission for many thousands of new homes. Developers are not building on these sites either because of lack of finance or because they expect land prices to rise and are speculating.(1) The Coalition has made many promises to solve the housing crisis but instead fuels the next land price bubble by under-writing homebuyers' deposits. As planning minister Nick Boles has previously admitted, the only way to seriously deal with this speculation is to tax vacant urban land on an annual basis. While this would cause a temporary fall in house prices it would also make the existing homes more affordable to first-time buyers and stimulate the housing market, with a knock-on benefit to the wider economy. Dr Tony Vickers, Professional Land Reform Group. 1) Actually there's a contradiction there. If the banks (or others with a bit of spare cash) are unwilling to lend to developers, that must mean they fear price falls; if the developers are hoarding land, that must mean they expect prices to rise. They can't both be right.
