It is with a heavy heart that we publish the final edition of Nimby Watch. Over 32 pieces, Jonn Elledge has exposed the most egregious cases of Nimbyism and shown us why major planning reform is so badly needed.
For this last instalment, we’re taking a look at the country at large and the selfishness causing its decline.
Where to this week? A little known declining power by the name of the United Kingdom of Great Britain & Northern Ireland.
Well, it’s a novel start. This may be the last chance you and I have to discuss the damage done by the scourge of Nimbyism in these pages, best beloved, so rather than look at a specific case I thought I’d conclude with a general howl of rage concerning the damage done by our shortage of housing, and the lack of urgency in attempts to address it.
A lack of urgency? The Government has made addressing the housing crisis one of the cornerstones of its policy agenda! Has it, though?
Keir Starmer repeated the target of 1.5 million homes in that thrilling, definitely-not-a-reset speech he gave on Thursday morning! He even described it as ‘a clear message to the Nimbys, blockers and naysayers’. Yes, but it’s easy to announce a big number – every party has done that at every election for as long as I can remember. Translating that into action on the ground is considerably harder, and it’s not clear that those actually tasked with delivery are getting the message. Consider the London Borough of Croydon.
Aahh, the concrete Catalonia, the Barcelona of South London! London’s most populous borough is home to nearly 400,000 people – it would be in the 20 biggest cities in Britain in its own right – plus a lot of skyscrapers, municipal shopping precincts, and, delightfully, trams. Throw in some fast trains to central London, and you’d think it the ideal place to build, right?
Right! Wrong. Jason Perry, the elected Conservative mayor, has declared that the borough’s local plan must ’emphasise character over density’, and so the council has submitted a new version of its local plan ‘remov[ing] all intensification zones’ to the Planning Inspectorate. This feels a lot like fighting the housing crisis with one hand tied behind your back.
Which bit of Croyon’s ‘character’ is he trying to protect, exactly? Now, let’s not be rude.
Maybe the Planning Inspectorate will demand they stop mucking about. Maybe! But I’m not feeling hugely optimistic because a few dozen miles away in Oxford, that same inspectorate recently sent back the proposed local plan for being – you’ll like this bit – too ambitious.
I’m sorry, what? ‘While the inspectorate accepted that 481 homes a year should be built within the city’, reported Inside Housing, ‘it rejected the total target given that 841 of these would need to be built outside its boundaries’. This is a problem because Oxford is so tightly bound, not to mention old, that there is almost no spare land for building the necessary homes inside the city. In effect, a pro-building council has been told, by the actual planning inspectorate, to lower its sights.
Well that won’t help meet the Government’s target. Which has bigger problems anyway. Earlier this week, the Centre for Cities think tank warned that the Government’s planning reforms weren’t ambitious enough to meet its 1.5m home target. Even if the private sector builds at the fastest rate it’s managed in 80 years, it’ll be nearly 400,000 homes short. It’s called for a switch from discretionary planning, in which councils decide every development individually and thus come under constant pressure from Nimby voters, to something more akin to zoning. The Government has so far shown limited appetite.
Okay, but… We never really thought they were going to hit it, right? Did we not?
And sure, we’ve had a lot of fun shouting at people trying to claim other people’ property as common land, or Green councillors opposing solar panels, and so on – we all like pointing and laughing at public displays of selfishness. But did it really need you to bang on about it for three dozen bloody columns? Yes. Because this stuff matters.
Because Britain’s housing stock currently offers the worst value for money of any advanced economy. Because we pay more money for less space, and that affects everything else we do.
Because over 280,000 people – enough to fill a city the size of Derby – are currently homeless. Because rough sleeping rose by more than half in the decade since 2010.
Because the cost of papering over these problems the best we can means the state is pouring ever larger sums of money into temporary accommodation and housing benefits without actually fixing the problem.
Because unaffordable housing means people can’t afford to live near the best jobs, and companies can’t recruit the best staff, it is having an impact on productivity.
Because people can no longer afford to have families of the size they might want, hitting fertility and storing up a demographic timebomb.
Because the lack of housing, not to mention lab space, transport or energy infrastructure, are almost certainly huge reasons why Britain is at serious risk of falling out of the ranks of rich nations.
And because every time someone opposes a development because they don’t want the bother of construction work or a slight disruption of their view, they are adding to each and every one of those problems, for no reason beyond their own abject selfishness.
Yes, this column has often been silly. But all these things matter. Addressing the housing crisis would make addressing not quite, but very nearly, all of our other problems easier to solve. In a better world, Nimbyism without a very good reason – claiming this project was different, when it very obviously isn’t – would be as socially acceptable as facial tattoos or relieving yourself in the street. These people should be tarred and feathered.
Oh. Well. A very happy Christmas to all of you at home, all the same. Won’t be that merry for those kids in temporary accommodation, will it.
I will miss arguing with myself. We’ll probably keep doing it when no one’s listening.
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