Der britische Minister arbeitet an Plänen für einen staatlichen Wohnungsbauträger

Absolute madness that this wasn’t brought in from the get go when Labour got in

Why don’t you provide a better education and work environment rather than feeding and sheltering the public?

This is the kind of big announcement that Starmer’s government should have said was in the works a year ago. They really did have a comms issue though unfortunately 

State owned housing developer with a mandate to train apprentices, force developers and other companies like supermarkets that hold land hostage to sell would be a start. It doesn’t need to be cheap council housing, just decently prices homes for first time buyers or people genuinely wanting to move house. No landlords, no investment companies, regulations about who can buy and sell the housing.

That could even force the private companies to act better, build it or lose it.

Gobsmacked that bureaucracy has caused private development to grind to a halt, and the answer is apparently a public developer. Clueless

Building houses is complicated, and requires paying the people who build them good money, something the state isn’t in the business of.

If Starmer went into July 2024 with this, his approval ratings wouldn’t be shit tier.

Shit, Burnham’s coronation into government might actually mean something.

personally done right this is a remarkably good idea.

set up production to be steady so its constant work, at which point it should be 100% in house without needing to sub to contractors. bring in proper training stuff for the workforce too and it becomes a career choice with a bit of stability both in build and maintenance

go with solid designs, suitable technology from the ground up, e.g. design for heat pumps, decent ventilation, grey water reclamation, suitable insulation, EV charging & parking (obviously not all will have space), solar & battery etc – then a range of property sizes but largely standardised designs for low & mid density developments – including the required amenities

the hard part will be setting it up to integrate directly with local councils who should be the primary staff employers, the purpose being to make the next government going „oh we can see that off!“ somewhat harder to do

need to see the details if/when they come out on how it would be done but this is something that could be started off quite small and scaled up gradually.

individual homes will cost more to build, because they will be to higher standards, but cutting out a lot of the middlemen taking their cut should see the end rental unit prices in an affordable range

even today ex 1950’s council houses can still be remarkably well built against some of the modern rabbit hutches

firmly though, think and integrate it, link to the education system for apprenticeships and training, firmly into local councils to manage the planning process and focus initially on government owned land

Fuck me these lot might actually try. Makes a change.

In theory sounds a good idea but I get the feeling there will be some backhanded deals involved along the way to line their own pockets and probably not bring the price of housing down at all

If the market can’t do the job, which seems to be the case, the state should.

This is what Labour governments are for.