Wemmick was the humble clerk in Great Expectations who desired to turn his humble Elephant and Castle home into a fortress, complete with drawbridge, with the Dickensian version of a Gatling Gun on the buttresses to ward off boarders. Today he’d be permanently in the Planner’s Office, lodging yet another objection to his neighbour’s building plans.

From the pages of the Guardian – where else? – over the last 21 days, the earnest champions of the poor and dispossessed have lodged the following objections to solving any of the nation’s housing problems. Henceforth known as ‘you can’t go up, you can’t go down, and you can’t go sideways’ – and ‘definitely nowhere where I can see it’.

Let’s take ‘you can’t go up’ first. Ken Livingstone, darling of the left, first suggested building more high rise apartment blocks in London. Forget the howls of protest concerning asylum seekers ‘forced from their communities’ by the housing benefit cap. Attempts by developers to build affordable housing in high rise blocks now become ‘an invitation to tax evaders to park their cash in the UK”. Beautiful hypocrisy from a newspaper kept afloat by a tax evading Cayman Isles trust, but we shall let that pass.

On December 2nd, Livingstone stood accused of ‘dinning in private’ with developers (not out in the street where we could see him – whoa!) and agreeing that ‘they should be allowed to build as big as they wanted, as long as he could take a tithe of the proceeds to spend on such things as affordable housing’. Generating money for affordable housing is no consolation when the view of the ‘gothic spires of the Houses of Parliament’, seen from your post prandial wander beside the Serpentine, is ruined by the sight of affordable housing soaring into the skies in the Elephant and Castle. It may be eco-friendly, it may help to finance housing for the homeless, it may even be sustainable – but if it ruins your view from the Serpentine, it’s a no-no. Even the Shard came in for criticism, on the grounds of ‘ruining the view of St Paul’s from Hampstead Heath’…..a view of St Paul’s being uppermost in Leftie eyes when out dogging on Hampstead Heath…

Perhaps you can go down? Kensington is the ‘most densely populated borough in the country, with no room to build outwards, and no permission to build upwards – so the only way is down’. Kensington is one of the councils accused of running a ‘Kosovo style social cleansing policy’ when it announced that it could find no more room for more homes and was considering housing benefit claimants in Derby.  Surely the Guardianistas would be pleased that a way to create more housing in the borough had been thought of? Nope, back on November 9th, they were fighting off that suggestion.

There are no planning laws which cover what goes on below ground, and architects had realised that instead of their clients decimating housing stock by buying up the house next door to create more space, they could dig down, incidentally shoring up old housing stock which had been built with flimsy foundations.

Over the past four years, this local authority alone has granted planning applications for more than 800 basement extensions, refused 90, and has a further 20 outstanding.

The Guardianistas are still unhappy – it seems that ‘vast swathes of impermeable concrete beneath the surface can prevent rainwater soaking away and increase the risk of flash flooding’. Quite apart from all the work going on making the pleasant Borough of Kensington ’seem like a war zone’.

How about side ways then? Not in Kensington – there isn’t a sideways…but out of London, out of the brownfield sites?

Just in case you had thought of that, here comes Andrew Motion yesterday; emoting ”somewhere between horror and enormous anger” that Nick Boles might be about to build in the countryside and spoil his view in his attempts to house all those people that the Guardianistas insisted were necessary to take Britain forward into the brave new world of multi-culturalism.

The government concedes that the UK is in the grip of a housing crisis with the number of households expected to expand at the rate of 230,000 a year, creating a demand for housing that the current stock cannot fulfil.

Has anybody got any sensible suggestions as to where the extra 230,000 homes a year could be built, now essential since feminism has decimated marriage thus creating the need for twice as many houses, and invited half the poverty stricken world to come and live with us,  that won’t upset the very people who brought about this situation?

Pat December 6, 2012 at 18:22

The solution is already under weigh! Its called the Liverpool Care
Pathway.

Elena ‘andcart
December 6, 2012 at 18:48

Yes. And I can’t get my head around that one either. It is Murder. And it
is time that someone bloody well said so. Removing Fluids will result in
Death. And it is an exceedingly cruel and inhuman way to treat anyone, no
matter how ill. I would rather die from an overdose of Morphine, thank you
very much. Or does that cost too much?

Friend of Dog
December 3, 2012 at 09:52

Anna please, please, stop reading the Guardian. Your blood pressure doesn’t
deserve it. Come to think of, it the world doesn’t deserve the Gruniad.

Ed P December 2, 2012 at 22:45

The armed forces have huge numbers of empty properties, even more are
available since their numbers have been reduced (to an inadequte number to
protect the Falklands, etc., but that’s another story).

Frankie December 2, 2012 at 19:10

Q: ‘…Has anybody got any sensible suggestions as to where the extra 230,000
homes a year could be built’?

A: The Moon! Plenty of room, but, unfortunately, not much atmosphere…

Mudplugger December 2, 2012 at 17:54

Although open-door immigration has indeed made a significant difference to
housing demand, we also need to acknowledge the social trends in household
sizes. In only 40 years (1961 to 2001) the average household size fell from
3.1 to 2.4 people – that takes millions of extra homes to accommodate,
regardless on any incomers.

If we went back further, we would see even higher occupancy levels, largely
due to multi-generation sharing – perhaps a combination of housing shortage,
high rents, inconsistent income, mortgage unavailability and general financial
instability will bring about a widescale return to multi-generation living,
which was the norm until only a generation or two ago. (And it has the
additional benefit of solving the childcare issues for many too, thus saving
the hard-up State even more unnecessary cost.)

It is interesting to note that many long-established immigrants still live
in multi-generation households – heaven help us if/when they adopt the
living-alone model.

dak December 2, 2012 at 17:48

Private new towns, like this one intended for here in the Republic? http://www.owenstown.org/index.php (Should really be called
Daleville, but why let real history get in the way of a socialist myth?)

I wanted to ask them if their green ambitions meant that they would not be
connecting to the National Grid, but their email link is broken – doh!!

If I were a Daily Mail reader, would I suggest that the best place for
housing these new residents may be near to Krakow?

cascadian December 2, 2012 at 17:47

You cannot build up,down or sideways huh. seems they are working towards
the favourite Guardian and liebour policy-eugenics and euthanasia-for the
English of course, to much trouble to apply it to the immigrants.

You old people demanding your pensions and electricity are just a damned
nuisance in Cool Britannia.

English Pensioner December 2, 2012 at 17:06

Everyone just talks about houses or homes and forgets the
infrastructure.
Around here drains are overflowing because they weren’t
designed to take the extra homes which have been added. Similarly the
electricity supplies are having to be upgraded to cope with the extra demand,
schools are having to have extra classrooms added on, the roads are crumbling
under the extra traffic which is almost at a standstill during the rush hours.
The two doctor’s surgeries are overloaded, new patients are being enrolled
miles away.
These are the costs which the builders and their new houses
cause, but to which they don’t contribute in any way.
The solution to the
problem is not to build more but to have a virtual ban on all immigration. We
should make it clear that no-one gets any benefits until they have lived and
worked legally in this country for at least five years. We must be the only
country providing benefits and healthcare to the world.

ivan December 2, 2012 at 20:09

EP, the beauty of using fitted out containers as housing is that they can
be installed on old, cleaned, industrial sites. Most of those sites have the
infrastructure in place and so shouldn’t make any extra demands on what is
available.

We should make it clear that no-one gets any benefits until they have
lived and worked legally in this country for at least five years. We must be
the only country providing benefits and healthcare to the world.

I couldn’t agree more, but if it was stopped today there would still be
the backlog of people without housing, exacerbated by divorce rates and
single parent ‘families’ – an oxymoron if ever there was one.

binao December 3, 2012 at 08:33

English Pensioner; sounds as though you live in my West Sussex
village.
re your migrants issues- don’t forget it’s open borders both
ways in Europe; we’re signed up to that. My guess is that although there
will always be some scam merchants, most of these people came here to work.
We’ve probably got the best because the rest are still at home happy with
their lot. The real time bomb is the population growth when these young
people become established as families rather than single
jobhunters.
Don’t forget developers are already obliged to contribute
money to offset the extra burdens- s106 money. Trouble is, the council
either lose the money, fritter it on other things or on bus services to
nowhere. Smaller developers have successfully challenged the obligation to
contribute.
In essence, existing locals must ride bikes/walk everywhere
to offset the environmental impact of new development. OK for housing devt,
maybe. But so a supermarket can enlarged?
Moan over.

Elena ‘andcart
December 2, 2012 at 15:58

I suspect that you are all becoming a trifle hysterical. What’s wrong with
all they lovely immigrants? And it’s their Yuman Rite, among other
things.
Around here you can’t see the fields for Maize. That stuff we all
get a subsidy for growing, even in our own back gardens. We have a lot of big
back gardens in France. No chance of any new housing estates at
all.
Britain should grow more Maize. And you can always use the stalks to
roof passing shelters. Good stuff, is Maize.

Brian December 2,
2012 at 13:38

Why not build Boris Islands off the coast as new towns? The caisson
technology has been around since Mulberry harbours and the construction of
offshore barriers would mitigate coastal erosion and enable wave power
generators to be installed. If more land is required, the area behind the
barrages could be drained and filled with terra preta like soil or recycled
construction materials to permit the erection of buildings.

Zaphod December 2, 2012 at 14:43

What? My house is right on the sea front! There’s nothing but sea and sky
outside my windows. That’s why I bought it!
And now you want to fill it
with rubble and put houses there? Are you bloody serious?
Not in my back
yard!

Observor
December 3, 2012 at 06:23

My old friends Lord & Lady Long have such a stunning house on the
Cornwall coast on a large piece of rock but the peasants keep partying
beneath and are driving them out.
The problem is the peasantry class
have become middle class and I blame Rupert Murdoch and the Daily Mail,
Sky News and of course- Tony Blair. When everyone knew their place all was
well with the world. I left the UK in ’87 and returned in 2002 to find
Property Developers had become acceptable in polite society.

Anna
Raccoon December 2, 2012 at 14:54

I do like your idea – as accommodation for MPs. We could control the
lobbyists who were allowed over ‘Checkpoint Right Charlies’. They’d all be
in one place when they had to vote, and we could have bulk (Halal,
naturally) catering instead of subsidised restaurants…..two blocks so we
could separate the men and women – no more sex scandals! (Ah, we’d have to
separate the men and the men, wouldn’t we?) One hour a week of televised
content – ‘I’m an MP, get me out of here’. Yes, I’m quite warming to that
idea….
Only wind power too, and no whinging when there wasn’t any
electricity…

ivan December 2, 2012 at 15:09

What a brilliant idea Anna. It might just focus their minds on how
everyone else lives You did forget to mention that they pay for all
services out of their own pockets and it’s not reclaimable on
expenses.

Wigner’s
Friend December 2, 2012 at 15:59

And as The Houses of Parliament are due refurb, we could actually move
parliament and the respective depts (complete with Civil Servants). If it
was placed in the Wash or Morecambe Bay that should free up some housing
in the capital and create some space for those who actually contribute to
the economy.

Ted Treen
December 3, 2012 at 13:03

If they were all MPs there’d be no shortage of wind or hot air…

Saul December 2, 2012 at 12:18

Just applied for a building permit for a new house.

It was going to be my dream home, 100 ft tall and 400 ft wide with 9
turrets at various heights and windows all over the place and a loud outside
entertainment sound system.

It would have parking for 200 cars and I was going to paint it bright
purple with a pink trim

The Council refused me planning permission.

So I sent in the application again, but this time I called it a……
Mosque.

Work starts on Tuesday……..

binao December 2, 2012 at 11:48

I thought our population was stabilising in total numbers 10-15 years ago,
with the only obvious problem being ageing.
So I wonder what’s changed and
when?
Still, it’s not just houses, it’s all the other bits, transport,
hospitals, doctors ,dentists, schools, jobs, energy, water, drains, air
pollution…… And it’s not all that good at present.
My own local preference,
living near what was a decent rec, would be to build on non-league football
pitches that are close to homes.
Why provide and maintain so much land for
some theatricals to roll in the mud, spit, swear and shout.
What’s the
greater need?
Nice bit of cash for councils too.
Apologies to the
ballkickers, but being taken as a treat to stand on Elm Park’s icy terraces
from the late ’40′s on didn’t help.

Frank Limadere
December 2, 2012 at 11:30

I don’t know what you’re bleating about. If we need 230,000 new houses a
year and we’re not going to build 230,000 new houses a year that means the
value of MY house will go up. And that’s the important thing. Right?

John
Galt December 3, 2012 at 16:07

Thus spake the genuine voice of middle England.

Conserve everything once I’ve bought my little bit. What about those
entering the workplace / family life who are needed to pay your pension,
might even be you sons, daughters, nephews, nieces? where are they going to
live?

Simon Cooke December 2, 2012 at 11:26

I believe that the strategy described here is properly termed “BANANAs” –
build absolutely nothing anywhere near anyone.

Zaphod December 2, 2012 at 10:59

London? Let it wither. It’s too big. Its surface-area-to-volume ratio is
ridiculous.

I know that “New Towns” seem a discredited idea, but most existing urban
developments appear to be utterly stalled.

The old New Towns were designed around the car, and I suppose that is no
longer tenable. What next?

Ribbon development!

Forget bunches of houses, create strings. Think how simple public transport
would be with only two routes, north and south, (or whatever).
No road
junctions to create traffic jams. Okay, you’d never see the countryside on
your commute to work, but every house would have countryside behind it. Build
as high and as low and as deep as you want, but no side roads, no estates.

It won’t happen, I know. Not til the current set-up collapses. But all
attempts to patch up what we have now are just prolonging it.

Zaphod

Span
Ows December 2, 2012 at 10:57

Very good; needs highlighting; and there are even some that try to claim
that immigration has nothing to do with the housing shortage. This is only on
facet of the multiple problems dragging the entire UK down the slippery
slope.

ivan December 2, 2012 at 10:55

Maybe they could take a leaf from one of the Brighton housing trusts books,
a trust that are looking at converted containers to house the homeless.

This idea is based on the Amsterdam Keetwonen student housing project that was opened in 2006 and
MAY close in 2016.

ivan December 2, 2012 at 10:58

Sorry the Keetwonen reference above is incorrect. This one should
work.

Bill
Sticker December 2, 2012 at
15:07

Sensible idea. Solid construction, high density, unit build. Allows
remote assembly, lowered on-site costs and simple demolition. If the PR
blurb is to be believed, spacious & quiet, too. Probably a lot better
than most UK building stock.

That being the case; don’t expect anything like them to be built in the
UK. Far too practical.

Elena
‘andcart December 2, 2012 at
15:42

And of course, you can always uplift them and dump them in a desert
somewhere far away. Preferably with the occupants in situ. But just not
in France. Please.

ivan December 2, 2012 at 17:37

If anything the PR blurb is understating conditions. I have lived in
some of these when I was working on contract in the middle east and the
Australian Snowy mountains. In all cases the insulation was excellent
and the places very comfortable, in fact, should I ever return to the UK
one of the 40 ft ones would be my first consideration for housing..

John
Galt December 3, 2012 at 16:02

My initial impression from the photos was that they look quite nice and
had a reasonable level of finish to them, but even so not cheap options,
still requires land (even if only temporary sites for 5-years between
demolition and redevelopment).

What would they look like if used to house the neglectful? Pretty crap,
pretty quick I suspect.