Starmer bets on housing over green belt in hunt for votes

Labour seems prepared to face down local protests in the push to build more homes, says Sean O’Grady

In his speech on Tuesday, Starmer promised to accelerate the building of new homes on unused urban land (Getty)

Keir Starmer has been accused of flip-flopping or being vague on policy. He was long on criticism, short on solutions, you might argue – hence why Boris Johnson tried to lumber him with the sobriquet “Captain Hindsight”. Yet now Starmer has committed to getting some 1.5 million new homes built over the course of the next parliament, if elected. The emphasis is on urban renewal and “brownfield first”; but also a pragmatic relaxation of some of the rules on greenfield development. The question is whether the “decade of renewal” he’s looking forward to leading makes economic, business or even architectural sense.

How will he get this done when the public finances are so tight?

This is the clever bit, potentially. It will all be done by grateful developers, relieved by Labour of pesky planning regulations, and in return for some contribution to the local infrastructure and concessions to affordable housing. “We have to challenge the planning laws, we have to get real about where we’re going to build and we have to work with developers to get there at speed,” he explains.

Although Starmer invoked the spirit of the post-war Attlee government in announcing his policy, the emphasis will be on private housebuilders rather than traditional “council houses”, though they will be part of the mix.

This is new, isn’t it?

Traditionally, Tories were the developers’ friends. Now, Labour wants a partnership with them. It could be a bonanza. Labour’s idea is to build an unspecified number of “large-scale”  settlements on land acquired by dedicated state-backed companies that would buy land at lower prices, without having to factor in the increase in the value of land for potential planning permission.

Why aren’t the Tories doing this?

As with onshore wind farms and other development, so with housing – they are much more reluctant to confront local communities where development is not wanted. The Conservatives had flip-flopped about “top down” housing targets through successive leadership contests, only for any commitments to be reversed under pressure from communities. The Tories’ problem is that so much of their support is in areas most prone to new development, many of them with schools, surgeries and public transport already under pressure.

So is this Labour “mission” to build homes a vote-winner?

On balance, yes. Aside from an older generation selling up and cashing in on successive absurd real estate booms, the entire adult population of the UK is adversely affected by the housing crisis: the homeless; tenants with soaring rents; first-time buyers unable to get on the ladder; growing families unable to trade up; and anyone coping with sharply increasing mortgage bills. A home is a basic need and Starmer has a nice personal line about how his pebble dash, semi-detached childhood home was a place of security and shelter in troubled times. Any party that offers a feasible plan to increase housing supply and rescue Britons from unaffordable rents and house prices will seem a very attractive proposition.

What’s the downside?

It will put pressure on the green belt, and some voters will opt to vote against development by backing Conservatives or the Liberal Democrats. (In 1998, Labour deputy prime minister John Prescott was asked about development on the green belt and responded: “It’s a Labour achievement, and we mean to build on it.”)

Labour’s campaign coordinator, Pat McFadden, accepts there could be some resistance: “We don’t want opposition to be ignored – but we have to do this… The country has to face up to this."

Presentationally, the party prefers to call the lower-quality green belt, such as scrubland and car parks, “grey belt”. Spin is not dead.