The Housing Minister and the Case of the Missing One Million Ox-Cam Arc Houses
During a debate in Westminster Hall on 13th July, called by Steve Baker MP (Con, Wycombe), several Ox-Cam Arc MPs expressed grave concerns over the level of developments of their constituencies threatened by Ox-Cam Arc plans. The MPs commented on the recent Local Election results that had shown that even once safe seats like Amersham & Chesham could no longer be guaranteed to return a Conservative MP to Parliament. The voters had decided that enough was enough and that the over-development of their counties and districts had to stop. A recent CPRE Report ‘Beauty still Betrayed’ revealed that since 2017 85% of houses built on greenfield sites in the South-East and South-West of the country were built within Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONBs), a category of land that is supposedly protected from housing developments. More shocking still was the fact that these houses are being built at densities of only 16 per hectare, approximately half the density recommended as a minimum by many Local Authorities. These are obviously executive houses, not social houses for those in greatest need. Building executive houses on protected sites is effectively an Act of Enclosure of the 21st Century, with publicly-enjoyed land passing into the exclusive ownership of the rich and powerful.
Inevitably, in the Westminster Hall debate, the number of new houses destined for the Ox-Cam Arc was raised by many speakers. Replying for the Government, the Minister of State for Housing, the Rt Hon. Christopher Pincher MP (Con, Tamworth) began by emphasising the economic potential of the Ox-Cam Arc, described by him as ‘a very big space’, and promising that “with the right collaborative support from the ground up, not the top down, by 2050 we could see economic output in the area doubling to over £200 billion a year, with the addition of 1.1 million further jobs”, two figures from a report now of some five years standing that are uniquely associated with the highest growth scenario of Ox- Cam Arc plans - the ‘transformational scenario’ of the National Infrastructure Commission (NIC). The NIC’s own ‘careful research’ (their words, not ours) had shown that providing these economic and employment benefits requires one million new houses across that ‘very big space’ of the five counties of the Ox-Cam Arc (the million includes approximately 230,000 houses destined for London commuters who are not part of the additional 1.1 million Arc jobs, but who are expected to buy Arc houses because of London’s chronic housing shortage).
A few short sentences later in the Westminster Hall debate, Minister Pincher continued “When I hear talk from the Chamber of 1 million additional homes, points that were made in a report of some five years’ standing (Editor’s note; the same report that produced the economic and jobs benefits that the Minister had referred to earlier), I reply by saying that is not a Government target and it is not a Government policy.” The Minister was quite insistent on this point and continued “I suppose the best way to keep a secret is to make a statement in the House of Commons. I think the only way that we can put to bed or break open this particular secret is to keep repeating the point that 1 million homes is not a Government target.”
Mr Baker then interrupted to ask “Is it the case that the 1 million new houses were the National Infrastructure Commission’s idea, but that the Government have simply not adopted that as their target? I think that is what I heard the Minister clarify.” Trained in the Government school of never giving a straight answer to a straight question Mr Pincher replied “I am grateful to my hon. Friend. My fundamental point is that the local plans and local authorities remain the building blocks—if he will forgive the pun—for house building and commercial construction in the area.” and then left the subject of the one million houses altogether.
That NIC Report referred to above, Partnering for Prosperity, had been warmly welcomed at the time by the Government with an official response that began with “The government supports the National Infrastructure Commission’s ambition to build up to one million high quality homes by 2050 to maximise the economic growth of the Arc.”
So whether the Minister likes it or not, if he and the Government are committed to 1.1 million jobs and a total economic output of over £200 billion by 2050, that will require one million more houses across the Arc. Where else will all those workers (and London commuters) go?
Stop the Arc sent Minister Pincher a letter following the debate that you can read by clicking on it here (above right). If the Minister ever replies we are more than happy to put his letter here too.
A short news item about this debate on BBC TV South Oxford is on the right.
A few days later we learned why the Minister was so reticent about the Ox-Cam Arc houses during the Westminster Hall debate. Bev Hindle, Executive Director of the Oxford to Cambridge Arc, revealed in an Ox-Cam Arc webinar that he had asked the Government ‘to not mention the million houses figure’ because it was unhelpful. Unhelpful or not, it seems that now no-one in Government is prepared to put any number at all on the housing figures for the Arc.
One day, when Piglet was out, Pooh went to visit him at home. But “the more he looked inside, the more Piglet wasn't there.” In this case, it seems, the more the Minister of Housing looks for the one million Ox-Cam Arc houses, the more they aren’t there, either.