The above paraphrases several conversations I’ve had with people in government and is an insight into the defensive spin being spread in those circles.
👉🏻😖👈🏻 It’s the political equivalent of closing your eyes, sticking your fingers in your ears, and screaming “la la la, everything’s fine”.
This stems from the misguided idea that but for external factors such as: ➡️ Covid ➡️ inflation ➡️ interest rates
new housing supply would otherwise be humming along fine.
Let’s pretend they are right (which they are not) and all the issues were external. When faced with such a set of difficulties: 💸 escalating construction costs 📈 high interest rates 📉 low productivity 👷🏻♂️ increasing numbers of builders going broke 🏛️ poor state budgetary situation
is the solution to pretend everything is OK and assume homes will magically become affordable by themselves? Or does it require meaningful action to be taken in response to the new circumstances (like, I don’t know, work with industry to deliver what actually works)?
Everyone bar those in charge seems to know the answer is the latter.
In truth, the dire situation impacting #feasibility of new #housing #construction has not arisen outside of #government intervention, but is a direct result.
Let’s recap governments’ collective contribution from recent years: 🤦🏻 multiple planning and building regulation changes accelerating underlying cost increases 🤦🏻 rapid labor cost inflation due to over-investment in government infrastructure projects and crowding out of private sector 🤦🏻 numerous taxes, charges and contribution increases on property and development 🤦🏻 slow and poor decision making, and a lack of true facilitation/support for major projects to keep them viable 🤦🏻 ideological obsessions with “up not out”, slowing greenfield and middle-ring development at a time when apartment projects are far from feasible (and most people still don’t want them)
All reflect real government decisions, and all can be addressed by them too – they just need to start listening and acting accordingly.
The hardest thing seems to be finding the preparedness to walk back bad ideas and policies, in an environment where admitting you got it wrong is considered the worst possible thing politically.
The sooner they act, the sooner industry can begin the real work of fixing the problem.
🤔 Has anyone else been hearing the same or am I the only one?