0:00
in a new job, right? You're in a new job, you're doing the housing
0:04
About a month in now, about a month in. Yeah, and the thing I like about you, Steve, if the bells stop there
0:11
like Quasimodo with the bells, the bells, the bells. I just wanted to say, look, you understand your brief, I do get that
0:19
and you care very passionate about things any time I've ever spoke to you
0:23
about previous briefs and whatever, and this is a heck of a responsibility
0:27
that has been landed on your shoulders. Now, the first thing people are going to say to you, myself included
0:34
is you've set targets that are unachievable. They're unachievable. Let's be realistic
0:40
Are you going to have to amend them? Well, they're not unachievable
0:45
I hear what you're saying. I know it's a stretching target. But we've got a housing crisis in this country
0:50
We've seen the number of people sleeping rough in doorways and under bridges
0:54
double over the last 10 years. years we've got families stuck in temporary accommodation they call it temporary but
1:00
actually it's a single room and often people our families are stuck in there for a year with
1:04
kids sharing a bed the parents sleeping on the sofa in a single room and you got young people who are unable to make the dream of owning their own home come true in the way that I was when I was younger We can lock But how do you build them How do you get the whole system moving
1:23
Good point. Well, the problem is, what is blocking homes being built? It's our planning system. It's
1:29
too slow. It's too cumbersome. Blockers can too easily stop homes going ahead. Now, I'll give you
1:36
an example. There's a council in Essex called Rochford Council and they blocked 600 homes from
1:42
going ahead. It then went to the courts on appeal, got overturned two years later and then we got
1:48
spades in the ground and we got cranes in the sky and the homes got built. But what about all the
1:54
cost of that delay? What about the fact that for two years homes that people could have bought
1:58
weren't being built? So we need to get councils taking the right decision and not unreasonable
2:04
decisions and blocking homes when they could go ahead. So we're changing the rules. We're going
2:09
to have more powers to stop councils taking that kind of decision. Of course, I believe, and it
2:14
will always be the case, that residents should have a say over what can and can't be built in
2:18
their local area. But we can't have councils just blocking the homes that then close down the dream
2:22
of home ownership for millions of our fellow citizens in this country
