"A national emergency is emerging as a result of labor's failure to build houses"

Terry Tanaka claims that Labour's plans to build houses are failing and that it is easy to figure out what went wrong

Although there were many valid reasons for Angela Rayner's resignation as deputy prime minister earlier this month, her record as housing secretarywhere she oversaw a house building collapse that quickly escalated into a national emergencywas more significant than her tax-related blunders.

In addition to growing her own real estate business, Rayner was supposed to be spearheading a significant surge in new home construction.

Labour pledged to construct 1.5 million new homes throughout the parliament when it took office. Backbenchers in the lush suburbs would not be a major concern, so it could disregard all local opposition to new construction and get to work.

It was desperately needed. The UK hasn't constructed nearly enough new homes in more than ten years.

Over the past ten years, the number completed has averaged 230,000 per year, while net immigration has still not dropped below 400,000 and has occasionally reached 900,000.

One thing is evident when you consider the number of homes required to replace the current stock, as well as to accommodate an aging population and smaller family units: we are running out of housing.

The main cause of the skyrocketing rents, high house prices, and difficulty young people are having getting their first foot on the housing ladder is this.

Increased construction would lower rents, make homes more affordable, and spur economic growth.

The issue is that Labour's plans aren't succeeding. Only 32,000 new homes were started in the first quarter of this year, which is less than half the number required to meet the goal, according to figures released earlier in September.

Only 53,000 new homes were approved in the three months leading up to June, a fall of 3% for the quarter and 10% for the same period in 2023, marking a 10-year low in planning approvals.

No new homes will be built without planning permission, so there is little chance that the numbers will improve anytime soon.

The UK's cement output, meanwhile, has dropped to half of what it was in 1990, a level not seen since 1950.

Five tonnes of the material are used in a typical new home. The outcome is the complete collapse of housebuilding. The final total could be as low as 150,000, and we might only construct 200,000 new homes in the upcoming year. That's half of the government's (not very ambitious) goal.

"The housing crisis cannot be resolved by intentions and goals."

Determining what has gone wrong is not difficult. Like in so many other areas, it seems that Labour assumed that everything would be resolved right away if they only had good intentions and set some ambitious goals when they came to power.

It doesn't appear that Rayner realized she needed to make any changes at all. Instead, the minor reforms have had a negative impact and the system has remained largely unchanged.

To help achieve its net-zero goals, the government levied a landfill tax, but it was unaware that builders were the largest users of waste dumps. The cost of building a new home is predicted to increase by £20,000 just because of that levy.

There is less motivation for developers to construct anything because it has set stringent affordable housing targets for new developments.

Additionally, it has permitted its ambitious plans to switch to green energy to raise industrial electricity prices to four times the US and twice the French level.

Given that energy can make up as much as half of the cost of producing cement, it is hardly surprising that production has collapsed.

Fewer homes will be constructed if all costs are raised. We barely have enough housing being built to accommodate all of the asylum seekers who cross the English Channel every day, let alone everyone else. There was already a severe housing shortage in the UK.

But Labour has made it much worse since coming to power. Prices will rise, there won't be enough homes to house everyone, and it will become more difficult for people to find housing or even a place to rent.

The situation is becoming more and more of a national emergency, but at this point, the government is only able to increase taxes on the industry and set more unrealistic goals.