Thursday, May 26, 2005

Bulldozing Labour support

The Government has announced that some people don't want to live in Northern Labour strongholds!! How else do you explain David Miliband's comments that 10,000 houses in nine key regeneration areas will be demolished because nobody wants to live there!?! Why does Central Government feel that it needs to intervene in the housing market like this anyway? It is not confronting the causes of this population haemorrhage, just the consequences. What are the real reasons for this population flight? Too much crime? No job prospects? Poor environment? All these factors can be improved or fostered by Government. If Government partially improved these houses, I'm sure speculators would be keen to buy such houses and complete the refurbishments if the local economy was also improving.
If short term tax incentives are required to achieve this, that's fine, simply knocking down sturdy Victorian houses simply because no one currently wants to live there seems very short sighted. It could also relieve some of the pressures on the housing stock in the South East.

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