Housebuilders make billions while getting taxpayer subsidies ...yet still fail thousands of homeless families
SUNDAY MIRROR
THE Chancellor has been blasted for giving more taxpayer subsidies to greedy housebuilders – who rake in billions while making the homes crisis worse.
In his Autumn Statement, Philip Hammond ploughed another £1.4bn into the affordable homes programme as well as £ 1.7bn for developers building on public sector land.
Yet the biggest builders – Per simmon, Tay l o r Wimpey, Barratt and Berkeley Group – have all missed affordable housing targets set by coun- cils in recent years, while watching profits soar. They even plan to pay out £6.6bn in extra shareholders’ dividends by 2021, the Bureau of Investigative Journalism found.
Now housing experts are questioning why builders need subsidies when the top four raked in more than £2bn in pre-tax profits last year – with their bosses getting immensely rich.
Eight directors of major housebuilders together earned £230m in the past five years. Meanwhile, the number of homeless families in temporary accommodation in England has risen 45 per cent since 2010 to 73,120.
Two bosses, Tony Pidgley and Rob Perrins, of Berkeley, have taken £141m in pay and share sales since 2011. They have shares totalling £440m.
MPs and campaigners have accused the top firms of keeping housing supply low to drive up prices. The big four built 50,000 houses between them in the past year, but are sitting on 450,000 empty building plots.
Joanna Kennedy, chief of housing advice firm Z2K, said: “Only a fool would imagine the big volume builders work in the national interest.”
Shadow Housing Minister John Healey said: “We need much tougher rules. Non-developing firms should forfeit planning permission.”
The big four are all in the Home Builders Federation, who told us: “House building is a high risk business.”