380,000 new homes per year.

[JoM]

THere are not enpugh brick layers to build 300,000 houses a year.

There was a programme on TV which showed how modern prefabricted houses could be built much quicker, cheaper and better insulated than brick ones.
All that is needed is the land to put them on. One housebuilder is not buying any more land at the moment because of the cost.

When houses are mentioned does it include flats?

https://www.theplanner.co.uk/2018/01/25/wolverhampton-constructs-council-homes-offsite
These modular homes were constructed in Ireland and ‘built’ in Wolverhampton, we go past them often and they were up and inhabited in a very short time.

Unlike the new estate of social housing in our village where it took 18 months to build 7 semi detached buildings (14 homes) and 8 bungalows (also semi detached so 4 buildings).
Interesting though that bungalows were built, I know a lady who moved into one from a four bedroom council house where she’d lived alone since her husband had died, her children had left home years before. That freed up a house for a large family, and she loves her new bungalow.

Our estate is a mix of private and social housing. The houses are down by the main road, a mix of semis and terraces and there are flats too. There are five blocks in total of three and four storeys on the estate, three blocks are social housing and two are shared ownership.

There does seem to be a fair bit of social housing being built in this area. There’s another site earmarked in our village, a newly completed estate up the road from my Dad and a number being constructed on a huge new build estate in the area.

[Workingman]

However, Jo, where I live there are new builds of hundreds of three and four bed detached houses along the A660 Otley Road from Adel to Bramhope, and not a social house in sight. It was all green belt land at one time.

It is strip development along a main highway with more junctions and traffic lights. It's not for the hoi-polloi, you understand, it is all for the more well off escaping the degenerating middle city suburbs of Leeds. That is largely down to the policies of the City Council.

This is where we are heading, as Cromwell says. It has been going on forever. We knock down the older parts of cities and the well-to-do move out so that we can build "worker" homes. (For "worker" read "poor people").

Leeds had slum clearances in the 50s and 60s. Thousands of terraced houses were demolished to be replaced by high-rise slums. Those who could afford to moved to the newly bult suburbs, and so it goes on.

Look up Leek Street flats in Hunslet, Leeds. Built in 1968 and finally demolished in 1983. Fifteen years they lasted! "Streets in the sky", or "Hell on Earth", make your own mind up.

[Kaz]

That's good to know, Jo

Our estate is mainly 4 and 5 bed, but there are some 2 and 3 bed social housing dwellings, mostly by the road but some by the field opposite us. I believe Redrow had to include them to get planning permission, but recent developments don't seem to face the same strictures.....

[Workingman]

Kaz, no disrespect, but it sounds as though you live in one of "those" developments: 4 and 5 beds for some and 2 and 3 beds for.... well, you know... the others. Why do they only need smaller houses? A conundrum?

Sorry, but the country cannot go on like this.

See my previous image. That's where we are heading. It is not Utopia - it's Hell.

Do you want those developments just down the road in Gloucesteltenham?

No. Thought not. I don't want them near me, either, but they are on the horizon.

We need a big rethink about how we manage our country: its land; agriculture; economy and population. Unfortunately we do not have the guts to deal with the hard facts, so we go with the 'easy' snowflake options. Sorry, but we are done for if we don't harden up.

[Kaz]

Frank, I grew up in a council house, during my adult life there have been times when I would have killed for a 2 or 3 bed place on a development like ours. I should imagine most people on the council waiting list, or in private rental, would feel the same - a secure tenancy, reasonably priced, in a nice area. What's not to like?

I don't think you know me as well as you think you do, I have no problem at all with new building, I just wish it was social housing instead of endless, pretty unaffordable, private housing.

[Workingman]

Kaz, please accept my sincere apology. What I said did not come out quite the way I intended.

I am off for a hospital appointment so I will try to clear things up later.

Sorry.

[Kaz]

Frank it’s fine, honestly Please don’t worry about it, and I hope the appointment goes ok (((x)))

[Workingman]

Peeps, Kaz and I are still mates, it's all sorted. Chill. Thanks.

Hospital appt went well, so not a bad day.

[Kaz]

Excellent news 're the appointment

Always mates xx

[Suff]

Did anyone check how many new homes we build every year today? 230,000. So they want to increase it but not to double it.

New housing supply is currently lower than the Government's ambition of 300,000 new homes per year. Around 233,000 new homes were supplied in 2021/22. New housing supply increased year-on-year from a low point of 125,000 in 2012/13, reaching a high point of 243,000 new homes in 2019/20.