Ben Reeve Lewis Friday newsround #52

[Ben Reeve Lewis feels an anniversary coming on ..]

Bloody hell. Cant believe I’ve been doing this for a year.

When I ditched my previous series for Landlord Law Blog, TRO Confidential, worrying I was exposing too much of my client’s business, and suggested a newsround to Tessa I secretly thought “Oh no. What a commitment. I’m gonna have to keep on top of all news developments and have an opinion”.

In fact it has been a godsend. I have learnt so much and broadened my awareness of housing issues into the bargain. It launched me into twitter and blog world, and through that I met new contacts, new friends, and even new income streams [so where’s my percentage then??? Ed].

Benefits of blogging

Since starting this I’ve been on TV, done freelance research work, written for the Guardian, and generally learnt more about housing than I picked up in 20 years in front line housing advice.  And met some people who I would never have thought in my wildest dreams, I would ever have anything in common with, including portfolio landlords, debt collectors and letting agents.

On the flip side, I have also succeeded in pissing off people who I previously worked very well with.

Shelter comes to mind, who I used to train for since 1998 but have been dropped since my criticism of their rogue landlord campaign. And was sarcastically introduced as presenter on rent issues at a Central Law Training seminar at Holborn Bar Chambers a few months back by solicitor/chair David Smith as “An incessant blogger”. Ow! Handbags at dawn haha ….C’est la vie [David blogs too, although perhaps not incessantly … Ed].

Thanks to all the new friends I have made since I turned whining into an art form.  [And thanks to YOU Ben, for being such a brilliant Friday columnist – Ed]

The  story of the week

Usually I try to pick up a number of different stories each week, to give readers a good spread of what is out there. This week however there seems to be only one game in town. The publication of the National Planning Permission Framework, the NPPF, which came out on Tuesday afternoon.

It was all leaked well before hand to be honest, so every side had it’s reposts firmly in place and true to form the NPPF is either a back-slapping crony-fest or sigh of relief for those living around trees, depending on who you read.

The Telegraph has been firmly pushing from the angle of the Campaign to Protect Rural England for some time, not surprising as that is where the majority of their readers live. So they were happy with it

The worry overall was that when the 1,000+ pages of the original document was whittled down to just 53 it would give licence to build anything anywhere with few caveats. A fear it would be a gift to Cameron’s best mates and obviously, party contributions.

Property Newshound pointed out that property investor groups had attended 28 official meetings with government over the NPPF while environmental groups got just 11.  Inside Housing pointed out that whether councils agreed with the new framework or not they would have the NPPF regulations imposed on them if they didn’t have an NPPF friendly scheme in place since 2004 and 60% of councils don’t

Sitting nicely alongside the NPPF is the news that traveller sites are going to be banned in green belt land.  The last time I looked that is pretty much where all traveller sites are. They like the travelling and they don’t like the cities. That is the lifestyle. An interesting time to bury the news too, with everyone breathing a sigh of relief that the countryside is to be saved from being concreted over, who is going to raise any arguments about Gypsies?

Now let me just say, I haven’t read the framework, I don’t intend to read it either. I wouldn’t understand it anyway. I am simply interested in people’s responses to it. And I don’t have any firm opinions to be honest.

The problem

We have a housing shortage, for a while everyone was looking optimistically to the PRS to supply the homes and to an extent it has risen to the challenge as a new army of buy to let landlords jump in but most people are clear now that we simply need more homes to be built. Its just a question of where and how, which the NPPF aims to simplify.

People like the National Trust and Telegraph readers backing the CPRE obviously don’t want their villages hemmed in by acres of new build shanty towns and if we start cramming more stuff into garden space in the cities it is going to be intolerable. In London we already have a growing situation with landlords illegally renting out sheds. But what do we do? There is a homes shortage, they have to go somewhere, why not the countryside?

Style issues

And then there is the style of the buildings to contend with. Presumably the CPRE would be happy with a ‘Poundland’ store as long as it had a thatched roof on, while Prince Charles would baulk at anything that looked as if it had been built later than Brighten Pavilion. Where is the balance point? Damned if I know.

Ben’s place

Take a look at the picture I provided Tessa with. That is the building in which I work, the homelessness unit, or the ‘Concrete bunker’ that everyone who lives locally knows it as.

My desk is upstairs at the back, with a fine view of the builders yard and to the side, the back yard detritus of Domino Pizza.

That queue is simply the everyday scene half an hour before opening time, made up of people who have just been illegally evicted, people sofa surfing for the past 3 months, people fleeing domestic violence, etc etc.

Listing madness

Can you believe that this ugly monstrosity is actually a listed building? I kid you not. Apparently it is a prime example of a school of architecture known as ‘Brutalism’. Architectural critic Iain Nairn writing in the Guardian in 2005 said of it

“The gaunt honesty of those projecting concrete frames carrying boxed-out bow windows persists. It is not done at you and it transforms the surroundings instead of despising them. This most craggy and uncompromising of London buildings turns out to be full of firm gentleness”

………Tosser. I’ll bet he lives in a rural Oxfordshire Idyll and would chain himself to the railings of his local antique shop if any planner proposed an estate built with ‘Gaunt honesty’ in an ‘Uncompromising’ style down his way.

But maybe harmony can be brought to our homelessness unit in keeping with the balance being sought by the NPPF.

We could keep the Brutalist framework, it is Grade 2 listed after all, stick a thatched roof on it and a couple of Doric columns by the entrance. I think this would vastly improve the homelessness experience don’t you?

Of course being homeless they don’t matter and should be thankful for any Brutalist rabbit hutch they can get.

Ben Reeve Lewis

Ben’s runs  Home Saving Expert, where he shares his secrets on defending people’s homes from mortgage repossession Visit his blog and get some help and advice on mortgage difficulties,  catch up with him on Twitter and check out his free report “An Encouraging note on Dealing with your Mortgage Lender” and have it sent right to your inbox.