John,“The following may help you reflect on your views”.Why’s that – is it because they are unacceptable to you? It’s funny because although they are my words, the views expressed are lifted straight from Bastiat, Mises and Hayek. Indeed, these are views that were once widely held in the Conservative Party – you know, back in the days when you used to actually win elections and before you became the “socialist-lite” wing of the Labour Party.I am a free-market capitalist and make no apology for that – my views merely reflect economic reality. That the Conservative Party thinks it can defy economic gravity with money-printing (QE), zero interest rate policy (ZIRP), credit expansion, credit subsidy (e.g. the Help to Buy (H2B) scheme) and inflation is a difficulty only it can resolve – but I for one, am not fooled.Let us be clear what S106 and the CIL actually are. They are merely mechanisms by which government can raise money from the public without having to raise taxes. This is done by the developers putting these costs on the top of the purchase price of property that they are trying to sell to the public. The wheeze in all this though, is that it also increases the revenue received from Stamp Duty as a double-whammy on the consumer.So, does CIL, S106 and the Conservative QE, ZIRP and H2B policies mean that homes are become more affordable, or does it mean they are becoming less affordable? Clearly, anyone with a basic grasp of economics will know that all of these things will increase prices. The proof? Look at the HPI (House Price Index) for London last year – it’s getting on for a 20% increase!! I hope therefore, we can agree that the Conservative led government is doing everything in its power to prevent homes from becoming more affordable. Indeed, they are doing everything they can to either put prices even further out of reach or to trap people into debt servitude with mortgages that they couldn’t afford if H2B wasn’t distorting the mortgage market.Do you know when you use a term like “affordable homes” and actually put it forward as a solution, it speaks volumes to me. What you do with a term like that is draw a line and put “poor people” on the wrong side of it. What you say to them is, “You see these houses over here, the nice ones, the ones you would like to buy? Yes, well, they are not for you. These are yours over here the ‘affordable’ ones – you can rent or part-own part-rent them. Now be grateful to us”.What the “poor people” would actually like is for you to allow the house-price correction to run its course so that homes can come back within reach. What they want is for you to stop importing cheap labour from basket-case Eurozone countries while unemployment is already high at 7% so that wages can correct upwards (and demand decreases), again making property more affordable for them. What they want is for more houses to be built and Stamp Duty to be eliminated. What they don’t want is to be told not to question the government and to “reflect on their views”.If I am a buyer of a new home, why should I have to fund school places from the money I pay for my property if I don’t have children? Why should I pay for roads if I don’t have a car? Why should I pay for public transport if I don’t use it? You see what you’ve done is fallen into the socialists' trap of using democracy to vote yourselves other peoples’ money.So here are some reflections for you:Affordable Housing – the council spent £250,000 on 6 toilets, you heard me right: SIX TOILETS, they could have built or bought AT LEAST 2 properties for that money (Barratt were selling properties in their new development for less than £150k for customers such as councils!!)Affordable business space – how about the council stops milking business as their cash cows? How about we reduce the cost of doing business by not imposing ridiculous rates and council tax on them? How about we reduce regulation and red tape on business? All of these things will make existing business more profitable so that they can compete in the market and don’t need “affordable” space.Roads – build and repair them with the taxes raised from motorists. The government raises excessive amounts from these individuals as it is, and only a fraction of it is spent on road-building and repair.Transport and travel schemes – how about this revolutionary idea: the customer pays?The funding of school spaces and provision of employment training schemes: It should not be for people purchasing property to fund these. The provisions for these services should come from the dedicated budgets set aside to fund them. They should not be funded from revenues that cannot be predicted from one year to the next.If these views require more “reflection” then I am afraid you are out of luck. If I get elected these are the kind of views you will get to hear a lot more of.
Ryan Thomas ● 4106d