Vince Cable: Build On Golf Courses To Solve The Housing Crisis

[thecrashingisles]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/greenpolitics/planning/11146976/Build-on-Britains-golf-courses-to-solve-housing-crisis-says-Vince-Cable.html

Britain’s golf courses should be built on to solve the country’s housing crisis, a Cabinet minister has said.

Vince Cable, the Business Secretary, said most families would rather have a garden outside their front door than protected greenbelt miles away from their home.

Mr Cable was commenting on research earlier this year from the London School of Economics that showed more of Surrey is devoted to golf courses than housing.

In a meeting on the fringe of the Liberal Democrat party conference, he said that if he were in a middle income family in Surrey struggling to find a suitable home he would “ask myself is a golf course sacred or are there better uses of the land?”.

Mr Cable said it was a “cliché” to rely on brownfield land for new developments and insisted there must be a focus on using up agricultural land.

He told the meeting organised by Localis, a think tank: “Most people do want green, they want green but they would rather have it outside their own house than sitting 20 miles away where they have no access to it.”

The LibDem said new housing was being focused on the south east because “people are not flocking to Burnley”.

[LuckyOne]

I would propose a different solution. People ahead of cows inside the M25.

[R K]

Good idea.

Compulsory purchase orders of all golf courses is the way to go (1p per acre)

If you can afford golf club membership you're also clearly not paying enough tax, so Vince should tax that money too which would probably largely pay for the pension & care home underfunding.

2 birdies with one stone

Edited October 7, 2014 by R K

[Wurzel Of Highbridge]

I do like Vince Cable, he should move to UKIP

[Executive Sadman]

I don't disagree with him, but why single out golf courses. Same with the mansion tax. A completely fine proposal that they cover in the politics of envy by calling it a 'mansion' tax.

Why not say 'have a flat tax with no upper limit'?

They come off as Marxist cranks when they use such needlessly inflammatory language.

[19 year mortgage 8itch]

Good idea.

Compulsory purchase orders of all golf courses is the way to go (1p per acre)

If you can afford golf club membership you're also clearly not paying enough tax, so Vince should tax that money too which would probably largely pay for the pension & care home underfunding.

2 birdies with one stone

The way the young are being repressed there will be a surplus of golf courses in a couple of years. Many will be begging to be purchased for housing.

[dances with sheeple]

"It`s crashing, someone come out and say their line please about "shortage", Vince, you haven`t done one for a while have you?"

[billybong]

When it comes to the crunch Vince is all soundbite and no trousers.

[BalancedBear]

I don't see why private golf clubs should be singled out to be built upon. Presumably there must be many people in Surrey who want a golf course nearby, otherwise they would be going bust and nobody would be using them.

Perhaps we need to restrict the number of people coming into the UK. We do not need an ever larger population.

[Si1]

I don't see why private golf clubs should be singled out to be built upon. Presumably there must be many people in Surrey who want a golf course nearby, otherwise they would be going bust and nobody would be using them.

.

Nope

Restrictive planning prevents golf clubs use for higher yielding activities

It's a rigged market

They'd be sold in seconds if planning permission was granted, no way golf club members could pay the inflated fees to match the yield available from housing or industry

[FedupTeddiBear]

There is a golf course not far from where we live that has been earmarked for new housing and 2 new schools.

It is barely used - you see about 2 golfers there on sunny weekends and the clubhouse is used for all sorts of other things just to keep it going. All of the existing schools in the area are heavily oversubscribed with a number of local children being assigned to poorly performing schools 20 minutes' drive away because of the shortage of places.

Nevertheless, Mr Nimby and friends have been very busy! There are huge banners posted up on the fences of several houses along a busy road alongside the golf course saying "Save our golf course!!" "It's not too late - sign our petition!" "Don't concrete over the countryside!!" etc...

Very tempted to add my own graffiti to those banners.

[gf3]

I think what we need is something like a £1,000 an acre tax on land. With an option to give the land back to the government and rent it for only £100 a year instead.

Farmers would probably own the land their house is sat on but rent the land they farm because it would be cheaper. This however would stop the farmer becoming rich if PP is granted on that land.

[BalancedBear]

Nope

Restrictive planning prevents golf clubs use for higher yielding activities

It's a rigged market

They'd be sold in seconds if planning permission was granted, no way golf club members could pay the inflated fees to match the yield available from housing or industry

I'm all in favour of liberalising planning, but I cannot see the need to compulsorily purchase golf courses. The housing shortage could be solved overnight if we built a relatively few houses within every single town and village in the country. Large developments of slave boxes on gold course or any other land is not the solution to providing housing that people want. These developments only provide housing that people tolerate.

Edited October 7, 2014 by BalancedBear

[badsector]

I'm both worried and annoyed that the politicos just talk about numbers. No mention of quality. No mention of density. Having seen a number of recent developments both in person and on RightMove, I am disgusted at just how squeezed together the houses are. Consequently the gardens are mis-shapen and horribly overlooked, some gardens just being corridors between the brick walls of the left and right hand side garages. Nevertheless the politicos and builders will point to the fact that joe public is snapping up these "qwality" homes.

[Maynardgravy]

Can't we just build on golf courses to save us all from golf?

[shinkicker]

I live in Surrey (questioning getting out now as I am well priced out).

I have been in a rented place for a few years. Last year there was a open council commitee to discuss proposals for building on a patch of land, just off an A road that is an unused field that backs onto somewood. A lot of the locals (who already own houses of course) were deeply against it. They were their first and its where their labradors took a dump each morning before galvating into the woodland.

I stood up and mentioned that as someone local with a young family, the housing would be very helpful to those of us yet to have our own property within the local area...

I kid you not, they all turned round and looked at me like scum with a look of total disdain.

[thecrashingisles]

I'm both worried and annoyed that the politicos just talk about numbers. No mention of quality. No mention of density. Having seen a number of recent developments both in person and on RightMove, I am disgusted at just how squeezed together the houses are. Consequently the gardens are mis-shapen and horribly overlooked, some gardens just being corridors between the brick walls of the left and right hand side garages. Nevertheless the politicos and builders will point to the fact that joe public is snapping up these "qwality" homes.

+1

Unfortunately the rhetoric about 'affordable' homes doesn't help because any attempt to build quality gets attacked as unaffordable. The price of a house is transient but it's impact on the landscape lasts a lot longer so it's better to get it right and then let the market find its own level when the supply issues have been fixed.

[dances with sheeple]

I live in Surrey (questioning getting out now as I am well priced out).

I have been in a rented place for a few years. Last year there was a open council commitee to discuss proposals for building on a patch of land, just off an A road that is an unused field that backs onto somewood. A lot of the locals (who already own houses of course) were deeply against it. They were their first and its where their labradors took a dump each morning before galvating into the woodland.

I stood up and mentioned that as someone local with a young family, the housing would be very helpful to those of us yet to have our own property within the local area...

I kid you not, they all turned round and looked at me like scum with a look of total disdain.

You should have just stood up and said "That land is getting built on, and no c*unt leaves here until it does!"

Edited October 7, 2014 by dances with sheeple

[goldbug9999]

I do like Vince Cable, he should move to UKIP

I do wonder why Cable gets so much love here, hes a corporate shill whos main agenda is to facilitate the import of cheap labour from india.

[Venger]

When it comes to the crunch Vince is all soundbite and no trousers.

What's he done in the last 5 years to make any difference whatsoever.

Maybe he thinks he can live on this golf course idea for another 5 years, without anything getting done.

[Riedquat]

Of course the problem is that we will then concrete over all of the UK and then where will we be .... plus other such nonsense, housing takes up .... wait for it .... 1.2% of the UK. Yes one point two percent and 9% is urban. There is no shortage of land only a shortage of lane with 'planning permission' and that is political and controlled by the 1%. No reason why we can't DOUBLE the number of houses in UK. Also there are rows and rows of empty houses (could be redeveloped) in the North but no jobs. Instead everything is centered on London.

And you think doubling the number of houses wouldn't be very, very noticable? I get rather sick of people saying "It's only x%" (in this case apparently only the land the house itself sits on and not everything else that goes with them), as if because the number is a little one it's irrelevent. Try having 1.2% of the pixels on your screen dead and you'll find it very, very annoying.

Sure, you could easily fit that number of houses in but anyone pretending that wouldn't make the place rather more unpleasant is utterly deluded.

[Corruption]

Its that time again where all the ideas people would like to see are trotted out, and this time next year will be the time they're all forgotten.

If Vince had quit over H2B id say he was the man, but his govt backed it to the hilt and he went along with it, he is a man of zero principal.

[richc]

If Vince had quit over H2B id say he was the man, but his govt backed it to the hilt and he went along with it, he is a man of zero principal.

He certainly stood up against equalising the size of parliamentary constituencies (which would have reduced the number of LD politicians). He must have some principal.

Edited October 8, 2014 by richc

[Venger]

Cricket club with clubhouse + tennis courts I went to a few times growing up, was sold off early 2000s. Built exec homes there. Knew a guy renting one.. it had build issues... forgotten exact details.. not had contact with him since 2011 when he was, like me, becoming increasingly irritated by the rescue the market policies. (Developer also arranged cricket club to get small club house + new cricket pitch in the greenbelt, 3 miles away, in the deal.)

Had to laugh at this... I guess if hotairmail and all the other hpc turnips had their way, non-owner renter-savers should be made to pay the owners compensation, even when buyers are the ones outbidding us for these homes by £50K-£250K; wanting high prices, wanting more HPI, wanting to deny others... market for some we thought - VI paradise with trolls with their bags of excuses wanting others to carry the very buyers massively outbidding them.

RichByName
Join Date: Dec 2010
Posts: 29

Yesterday, 4:05 PM
Land immediately next to us - development proposal
Apologies if I have posted this to the wrong forum - and please feel free to move this to the correct forum if I have got it wrong. In the short term I am after some information regarding what advice I should seek, if any.

We are homeowners less than two years into our mortgage, and live at the end of our road. One side of the house overlooks a field used for football by the a couple of local teams. We recently learned that this land was owned privately and rented back to the Council.

Today we have received Development Plans for that land - 62 new properties are to be built on this football pitch and the grassland immediately around it. At the moment, we are unsure if this will cause some reduction in the value of our property. On the understanding that it's unlikely we can stop this happening (which being selfish would be the best thing for us, if not for the nations dwindling supply of housing), can anyone advise on the best way to find this information and whether we may be entitled to compensation in the event that the proposals go ahead?

Or is this the kind of thing buildings insurance may cover?

Details a bit thin on the ground at the moment - just a text from Mrs ByName, but if anyone has some obvious questions that I need to answer feel free to ask and I'll respond later tonight (after football, albeit not on that pitch - now that would be helpful!) or tomorrow morning.

Thanks in advance

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.php?t=5078500

I used to think like you but I've come down the other way now. People have little choice. They are not as obsessed and knowledgable as people here. They are basically being driven into a corner. Either suffer the travails of amateur landlords and short term tenancies or buy an outpriced home.

For many who want stability for their young families they feel they have no choice.

[frederico]

Vince cable, what's he got to do with anything