November 2010 Archives

I was extremely impressed to receive both a phone call AND an e-mail from the "Incentives Team" at CLG over the last couple of days offering UKR a face-to-face briefing on the New Homes Bonus (further to the publication of the New Homes Bonus consultation). 

I think this is a pretty exemplary level of responsiveness from a government department, actually, and I'm not - uh - exactly used to it. And I shall be saying so to anyone who will listen. Long may this level of proactive engagement continue. Dr Evans and I have arranged to go in there tomorrow to receive said briefing and I will, naturally, keep you posted.

Whilst we ponder our questions on the specific incentives scheme, I was thrilled to learn from EG and other sources that Oxford City Council (that well known progressive bunch of peeps), in its capacity as a landowner, is getting on with things. It has recently launched an exciting initiative for the selection of a joint venture co-investment partner to enable it to deliver its vision for the "Land at Barton".

This is a significant housing opportunity: the site is some 90 acres and is the single biggest opportunity for housing development within Oxford and "is currently safeguarded in the Oxford Local Plan (2005)" (does one sense a pragmatic approach to open source planning in play here?).

The majority of the site is owned by the council - which is a key fact of course - and has capacity for "up to" 1,000 (very much needed) homes with "ancillary commercial, social and community benefits".  Now 1,000 New Homes Bonuses would be something a little more than a hill of beans, of course, and we look forward to seeing how the sums play out over time.

It won't be for the faint-hearted this one: it is a pretty large infrastructure-led project which requires significant upfront funding (about £25m) before returns can be achieved through the sale of serviced land to deliver houses. But - and this is a very significant but - the long term partnership on offer with Oxford City Council must be well worth the long haul. Must be worth its weight in platinum actually.

The (inherently stable) council (with an experienced and smart officer cohort) has an ambitious vision for the land at Barton and is seeking to establish a partnership which is flexible, to enable it to potentially inject additional funding, possibly through using its Prudential Borrowing powers (on offer up front). 

Naturally, the city council will look to reserve the right to build its own social housing on the site if desired, but this is one monster of an offer for the right partner, one who is willing to look at things creatively and in real partnership. In addition, the council may look to recycle its future land receipts to increase the level of affordable housing provision and would want the ability for the joint venture vehicle to enable other stakeholders to participate as co-investors. 

This is a very exciting long term project and I wish Oxford City Council every success in selecting the right partner. And I look forward to getting updates on progress. A real partnership on offer here, in these challenging times. A joy to see.

The great thing about blogging is that it provides a platform for all sorts of views.  And for a luddite like me, this is something of a revelation. You don't have to be an authority in all aspects of regeneration (as I continually prove) to start a debate running. 

Housing is an excellent example.  I do not pretend to be an expert (in fact I almost wear my badge of ignorance with some pride, finding housing policy just too abstruse for words. Actually, I believe that way madness lies!).

I am still struggling with Grant Shapps's "Local Decisions: a fairer future for social housing" issued last Monday (as is Dr Evans actually, which makes me feel a little better about it all) and I'm hugely reliant on folk with real expertise, such as the lovely Alex Kendall, to come onto here and give me the benefit of their years of accumulated wisdom. 

There is no doubt that Mr Shapps has attempted to embark on nothing short of a Radical Debate about housing in the UK and its future delivery and tenure.  And there is no doubt that whatever we were doing before in social housing was not having anything like the desired effect in stopping people from being disadvantaged.  

Alex, in a howl of indignation, thinks that "the future of housing is poor" and asks whether the minister can indicate if the 2.4m people "on various lists will ever get a house"?  I think I know what he would retort to that (because I've asked him): he would say that the lists are no measure of real housing need, that many people sign up to many lists, in a cynical working of the system.  And that we need to look at things another way. 

Is he right?  Well whatever we were doing before wasn't working. The latest consultation is what Dr Evans calls "half way to paradise" in that it tries to be radical and strip things back but (I guess the civil servants have been in there) it is full of technicalities about tenure and allocations, reflecting the huge accretion of complexity in housing policy and legislation over many years.

I've eventually got to grips - partially, at least - with Monday's consultation paper "Local Decisions: a fairer future for social housing". 

Grant Shapps (pictured) had been his usual energetic self, popping up all over in the media to promote the thing, but he'd been overwhelmed by other news, and the commentary thus far has been rather low key. And, as I predicted on Monday, it is inevitable in any housing debate that attention gets focused on some key headlines (the ending of "tenancy for life" is always one such shibboleth) so there is mainly hysteria, and not much analysis, on how the proposals would play out in practice.

Changes to tenure and allocation procedures are a further part of the overall approach to housing. This includes the implications of the spending review, both on the overall capital funding and the proposed changes to rents charged in the social sector, the proposals for the New Homes Bonus, and the changes to planning.

We will not have the whole picture until the Localism Bill is published and more technical details on the Housing Revenue Account come in the new year (I know I keep saying "manana manana" - and I appreciate that this is a bit unsatisfactory - but we do need the whole picture here. And I am delighted to report that the "whole picture" will, in fact, get its first airing at the EG Launch of UK Regeneration in the new year).

The lovely Deborah Parry at Nabarro kindly invited me to join her table at the Westminster Property Association Annual Lunch - with 900 of your closest friends - earlier today. She is such a love. It was lovely to spend time with her and lovely to meet her very nice colleague, Barry Morris, who kept me thoroughly entertained.

Nabarro had gone to great pains to invite a number of female guests, as a result of which our table was predominantly women (in stark contrast to the adjacent tables). Deborah was rather proud of this actually, and women in the property industry (or the lack therein) became something of a theme throughout the lunch; with an exchange of amused glances when Gerald Ronson, our venerable guest speaker declared that our industry "was full of boys, those boys have become men".

Nabarro is, of course, currently undergoing a massive scoping study to determine whether it should move from its Lacon House HQ in Holborn or stay put. It is hard to believe that it will soon be 15 years since it moved from Mayfair and we were having a giggle over the London regeneration mafia (of which I was part of course) having to set up a Business Improvement District in Holborn under the leadership of Geoffrey Lander to... er .. facilitate the move (basically to try to assuage the sense of them having moved to bandit country!). It sure was a culture shock for the staff, as they were a real bunch of West End Johnies at that time. Bless them. But they got over it.

The firm is currently out to tender for agents to help in this rather fraught location-decision process and I was telling Deborah my affectionate tales of Digby Flower and his team flapping around the CBRE office the night before the pitch a couple of weeks back, losing their boards and losing their notes, and generally causing a right kerfuffle all around. I think she rather enjoyed these tales.

Whilst we wait for my pointy heads to give us the analysis on the statement on Grant Shapps's social housing policy yesterday (it's coming folks, it's coming), I was somewhat diverted by a couple of minor developments in the news.

The first was the Joseph Rowntree Foundation publishing a report which finds that it is very much cheaper to live in a city or a town than in the country. Well blow me down!

Apparently, a pensioner couple living in a village will spend £43 a week more than a couple of the same age living in a city on household costs such as heating, food, clothes and transport.

The Commission for Rural Communities, which initiated the research, warned that everyday essentials were beyond the means of many rural families, who faced bills of up to 20% more than their peers living in cities (examining a full range costs necessary for a basic quality of life).

The fact that this can be presented as news (on the Radio 4's Today news bulletin this morning!) is rather strange. As my friend Michael would say, in the style of Worzel Gummidge (and showing his age rather) "it makes your head burst".

Grant Shapps on Radio 4's Today programme this morning trailed his proposals for the "most radical and fundamental reform of social housing" which he will be announcing in parliament later this afternoon.

I always smile a little at a government minister going into broadcast media the morning of an announcement, when he can't go into detail.

But you're damned if you don't and you're damned if you do.  And he (Mr. Shapps) could hardly pass up the chance of getting first shot at communicating the reforms.

And he was at great pains to assure current social housing tenants that this wouldn't affect them (rather charmingly telling them to "go away and make a cup of tea" and not concern themselves) which, in a twinkling, gave some idea of the number of different interest groups that will need to receive a tailor-made message on this stuff.

We look forward to hearing the detail later today but, however that is framed, there will clearly be a major need to communicate this properly to all the various audiences.

And, given the history and the baggage, the vested interests concerned, it is tough stuff to communicate.

Hares will be set running. But we do need a proper debate on this very acutely. Preferably one not fuelled by hysteria. Whatever the "tough love" elements of the government's new social housing programme, it is clear that current social housing policy has not been solving the problem - has simply not been taking people out of poverty - and that we need new models.

Last day at MAPIC and a quick whirl around the Palais to scoop up any last minute bits of gossip or goodie bags.

I am rather notorious for being something of a cheapskate on the freebie front.

Indeed for a couple of years in the aftermath of the last recession (when 'imself was out of work and I was barely hanging on in there) I did the kids' Christmas stockings out of nick-nacks picked up at MIPIM (and kept under my bed for the rest of the year).

I had a veritable gang of folk who would liberate three of everything from obscure Eastern European stands for me. Some of it was quite good kit! Indeed, some of it we've still got!

And - at least at the time - the kids never complained about Crest Nicholson jigsaws or Hammerson stress balls, although of course in recent years the kidult has been darkly threatening to retrospectively report me to the NSPCC for parenting-under-false- pretences.

It's raining in Cannes this morning (I tell you this to cheer you up) which strikes me as a severe contravention of the Service Level Agreement.

I've got a good mind to drop into "Protocol" (next to Registration) - whatever that is - and Have A Word.

Mooched along the Croissette trying to dodge the raindrops and, first up, bump into dear old Mike Prentice, CBRE retail guru to the stars.

He seemed in the pink (despite suffering from a rotten cold), which he attributed to sticking to wine only, "yes yes yes I stuck to the wine" he assured me, but suddenly his face fell: "oh no! I've just remembered, I went onto beers later". Love him.

We were chatting away when suddenly he shouted "Crag Martin! Down from the mountains" pointing up at some nondescript bird hovering above the beach. I love old Mike. But I would never have had him down as a twitcher. It certainly is a funny old world.

Up at the crack of dawn, grumbling for Britain naturally, to take the plane down to Cannes and MAPIC.

Took a punt that I wouldn't know anyone on the plane and hadn't bothered with any lippy or anything.

Blow me down, if the first person I bump into isn't Susan Freeman of Mishcon de Reya looking totally immaculate as ever! Honestly, how very embarrassing!

Felt quite naked in comparison. (But then, always feel dishevelled in Madam's presence. And fat! And poor, come to that!)

Normal tiresome flight down. Full to the gills of course, and nothing much to report other than the usual fracas with property types bringing so much hand luggage into the plane that the girls couldn't fit it all in the lockers (so it had to go in the hold after all, which rather defeats the object!).

But blow me down if it aint the case that, after a long arduous journey, when you emerge into the crystal sunshine of a sparkly day in Cannes, all grumbles don't melt away.

The sun shimmers on the blue blue Riviera; the beautiful stick thin elderly French broads walk their daft little dogs in their non-PC fur coats; rich men amble up and down the Croisette sporting strangely coloured cashmere jackets and sun glasses; and thin rangy haggard-but-curiously-handsome men in silk suits sport lanyards bearing MAPIC badges. It is like MIPIM but it is not MIPIM. But all is right in the world!

Innovation. That's what we need for the future of regeneration: innovation. But where do you find it?

Mashing it up (as my kidult would have it) is the key to all this. It was the one thing that the old BURA had nailed spot on.

In its three decade history, regeneration has historically been far too fragmented between the sectors (the public, the private and the voluntary).

And when partnerships became the norm, prescribed from the centre, they ossified and became sclerotic. They lost their energy and cutting edge. They stopped having ideas and they stopped being fun.

We have to get that back somehow. And I am looking for Big Society to be more than self help groups for the middle classes (laudable though these are btw, I'm not having a pop).

And regeneration has been fragmented between the professionals too (planners, architects, developers) but also within all these categories.

Hmmm... so the consultation document on the New Homes Bonus was indeed published on Friday, as promised.

The key point is clear: "This policy redistributes a portion of formula grant on the basis of housing delivery."

Sad beggars that we are, we spent much of Saturday struggling with it I'm afraid. The analysis in the document is a little ...uh ... shall we say, impenetrable.

Dr Evans has tried to do some simple modelling but it is almost impossible to do without more detailed stuff on local government finance. The headlines are: when the policy is in full swing, it will be redistributing between 3% and 4% of formula grant which would mean 14,000 extra homes per year.

The consultation paper invites views on a number of detailed issues about how the bonus will operate.

More interestingly, it provides some technical analysis of the effect the bonus will have. On page 50 we find: "... a range of supply estimates from 8% ... to 13%. Under [the mid-point scenario] housing supply will be 11% higher than the baseline from 2016/17 onwards. Over the initial 10-year period this is equivalent to 140,000 additional units for the mid-point scenario."

Taken together with the funding figures this means that the bonus can be paid in relation to around 140,000 homes in the first year (but that only an extra 14,000 homes a year will result).

What is going to happen to the housing industry?

The eking out of supply gives me cause for concern. So you bid at auction for the piece of Georgian silver, because it's pretty and has historical associations.

But really it is an investment and the value is about scarcity. You would be rather miffed if you find another one in the auction the next day. And every day for the next year.

You might wonder whether "Trotters Fine Art" is the fine upstanding company it claims to be or whether a man in the back room is knocking these supposedly scarce objects out.

Of course it is land that is really scarce, not houses, but are we peddling something of the same dodgy story?

We all have a gap between rhetoric and reality. Take the impact of the Olympics. Of course it will make East London a more attractive proposition but it is a 30-year transformation not a four-year job.

Yesterday's Cala Homes ruling seems to have caused some confusion, and no mistake.

I asked Paul Evans to give me the received wisdom and he said "it is a muddle". Well thanks for that, dear.

It just has to have been a major embarrassment for the Coalition Government but they were quick to dismiss it.

Immediately following the ruling Communities and Local Government Minister Bob Neill said the judgment "changes very little" as the Localism Bill will "sweep away the controversial regional strategies" and the government "remains firmly resolved to scrap this layer of confusing red tape."

A lot of pressure is now piling up on the Localism Bill and there is still no firm date in view for this.

So what does this mean for the medium to long term future for delivery of new homes in the UK?

Like many folk in the industry, I've always been a huge fan of Mike Slade.

Leave to one side that he doesn't really do urban regeneration, all that devil-may-care cavalier behaviour, the sailing and the yachts, the lifestyle, the charity work, the Byronesque locks and - of course - the rampant political incorrectness, is a very attractive package.

Particularly to we irreverent souls. Even more so, if you spend a goodly portion of your life dealing with po-faced types, mainly in the public and voluntary sector.

One can't help but marvel at someone who has such a secure position that they can say what they want, when they want. It is enviable indeed. I would call him the enfant terrible of the industry, were he not so very senior and clever.

And so successful at what he does. And rich. And tall and good looking. And before I decide I hate him actually after all, I remember just in time that Mike used to employ my bonkers old mate Gareth Roberts (back in the 80s when he was in Bruton Lane); he was good to Gareth, and any mate of Gareth's is a mate of mine.

It was hugely encouraging to be invited to be part of a panel discussion for Young Entrepreneurs in Property last Friday morning at law firm Nabarro.

We were all there to give a verdict on the government, six months in.

I was mightily impressed by the event, even though it made me (and my fellow panel members) feel very very (very very) old.

The audience was not only young (ridiculously so, muttered one of m'learned friends), they were good looking, bright, feisty, informed, and roughly 50/50 men to women with a good showing from minority ethnic groups.

The quality of the questions was unbelievably high and they really put us on the spot. Damian Wild of EG in the chair was seriously infused with optimism; it made you feel proud to be part of the property industry and convinced we have a vibrant and vital future.

Sophie Eastwood of Holistic, who chairs YEP, and Liz Russell of Nabarro are to be hugely congratulated on facilitating an event in which the "old guard" felt proud to invest: this is the future, and thank the good gawd for it! A "feel good event" and no mistake.

Liz Peace was her normal authoritative self, and I did my usual combative and impassioned plea for urban regeneration. No surprises there then.

I got a lot of response to yesterday's larking about on the names of places.

One of my readers sent me an e-mail to say: "And if you really want to upset the good people of Gateshead for the great job that they have done on their quayside over the past decade, try referring to Gateshead Quays as Newcastle Quayside South, which I heard used by a Newcastle cheeky chappie recently. Response from a Gateshead council official was unprintable!" Love it!  

While we mess around with this sort of nonsense (at best a bit of a joke and at worst a continuing wearisome squabble about territory which is just a meaningless distraction), the big question facing us in regeneration is this: if the future of the sector is dependent on the private sector being ready to step up, just how on earth do we achieve this?

As Justine Greening said to a group of property professionals on Monday "We can't force you to recruit people to take up the slack". And they can't.

We need to drill down to understand what would make the private sector get re-engaged in the partnerships and, crucially, take up new recruits from the ranks of the unemployed.

What's in a name then?

This is a bit of recurrent theme in this blog (as far back as my blog on  16 April 2009) and it really does make me laugh.

We're certainly going to have a bit of sport over the daft names thrown up by these new LEPs (see my blog on 10 September 2010). But - amazingly - people still want to tinker with the names of places that appear in the Domesday Book.

Only this week, councillors in the Surrey town of Staines (which was the town chosen as home by Sacha Baron Cohen's for his fictional comic character Ali G) have been seriously considering changing its name.

Apparently, "business leaders" had said that changing the name to Staines-on-Thames would make the town more attractive to investors.

One of my correspondents (a right wag) writes: "I think Staines would have to change its name to, say, Uxbridge to really attract investment".

This reminds me of the Croydon story, when (in the 80s I think) they got in John Harvey-Jones to help them not be such a horrible place.

They spent a day presenting Croydon past, present and (hoped for) future to him, at the end of which he said (allegedly) "How fixed are you on, er, the name - Croydon. I think there may be too much baggage attached to it, and that a change might be necessary."

It was an action-packed day yesterday and no mistake. At 2pm I rocked up to Committee Room 4A in the House of Lords for the launch of the Kent, Essex and East Sussex Local Enterprise Partnership, all courtesy (rather incongruously but utterly charmingly) of Lord Brookman the doughty trade union veteran of the Iron and Steel Trade Federation. 

It was never explained quite WHY Keith Brookman was host to this sea of Tories but he clearly enjoyed it very much and congratulated all concerned on a warm and robust partnership. His introduction to the Minister was heart-stoppingly delightful, reminding Greg Clark that he was from Middlesbrough (a fact not widely known) and that he needs to keep a wary eye on the shenanigans at Corus there. Greg nodded sagely.

He went onto say "Greg went to South Bank Comprehensive, as we all did of course, and then to Cambridge - pause for comic effect - which none of us did of course".  

It was a lovely introduction. Very affectionate. Very sweet.

John McCready enjoyed a simply splendid showing at the Business Design Centre yesterday.

Not surprisingly, in these troubled times, the entire audience (including The Financial Times and The Daily Telegraph) was hanging on his every word to find out when he, as head of the Shareholder Executive's Property Unit, was coming out to play with all his shiny baubles. 

I think, on balance, what we heard was very good news for regeneration and not such good news for profiteering. Hurrah!

His speech was authoritative and measured. And it was reassuring to feel that there was a calm approach being adopted, with an eye to real economic growth, rather than any panicky fire sales.

So, no quick fixes. All in all, we had a rather elegant canter around the issues facing property in the national economy (well he is elegant, John, some might even say "fragrant").

He made rather a droll reference to the "unfortunate aspect of debt" (that it needs repaying) and reaffirmed the government's commitment to "continue to protect the vulnerable in society" (which was rather more than did Justine Greening, the Treasury Minister, who followed him. Although, rather charmingly, she was late because she had dispensed with her government car and now travels on the tube).