Bandwagons role as the site managers gird their loins for the fray
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Getting Britain building is still the BIG IDEA, with the encouragement of housing developments at the forefront.
Accordingly, the Homes and Communities Agency – part of the Department for Just About Everything – has announced the release of a new tranche of public land for development. It is part of a programme that will see land with capacity for up to 100,000 homes released for development by 2015.
The announcement coincided with the announcement that the shake-up of the planning process trumpeted by the DCLG will commence later this month. Henceforth, only major developments, some designated developments and Listed Building Consent, will require Design and Access Statements.
It appears that the number of developments receiving planning consent is already on the rise. The aforementioned HCA quoted a Home Builders Federation report showing the number of consents rose from 118,723 to 144,427 since the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) came into force last year.
Read more: Bandwagons role as the site managers gird their loins for the fray
Pickles ups the ante and the Lords look for legacy, but not in the architects’ statistics
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Today the House of Lords Olympic and Paralympic Legacy Committee quizzed former Olympics Minister Tessa Jowell and Ken Livingstone, who was Mayor of London when the successful bid was made.
The Committee has a number of issues to investigate regarding both the sporting and infrastructure ‘legacy’. Ken admitted as long ago as 2008 that the reason he “trapped” the then-Labour Government into the bid was to attract the billions of pounds of public investment into the area of East London that was earmarked for the site. The development of what was for a long time a derelict part of the capital has been a major achievement.
Read more: Pickles ups the ante and the Lords look for legacy, but not in the architects’ statistics
New homes get the hurry-up, but retrofitting what you’ve got cuts crime
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Housebuilding is still the big issue in construction, with Cleggie’s campaign to “get Britain building” attracting some distinctly un-LibDem allies. Boris himself has joined the fray by threatening developers who engage in so-called ‘land-banking’ with compulsory purchase.
The London Evening Standard quoted him as telling the London Assembly that the practice of sitting on land waiting for prices to rise was “pernicious”.
“To constrict supply to push up prices by land-banking is plainly against the economic interests of this city,” said the Mayor, although he conceded that not all stalled development was because of land-banking.
Read more: New homes get the hurry-up, but retrofitting what you’ve got cuts crime
Less fuss and less new build as the Scots get on with their Games
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My last blog on this site suggested an answer to a question which it didn't explicitly provide, although anyone carrying out a little research (and I mean a little) would have been able to infer the reason the Scottish Affairs Committee is investigating the so-called blacklist held by the defunct Consulting Association. It is because the citizens of that proud nation don't want the 2014 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow to be tainted with the whiff of any similar scandal.
OK, the Commonwealth Games aren't on the same scale or have the same impact as the Olympics, but anyone who was in Manchester in 2002 knows the feeling of optimism and pride the event can generate.
Read more: Less fuss and less new build as the Scots get on with their Games
Why the Government has left the investigation of blacklists to the Scots.
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While the Leveson inquiry into press standards has received mass publicity from all quarters and demands from some 'celebrities' to subject journalist to everything bar trial by ordeal, a more insidious and damaging scandal in the construction industry is attracting only a few passing mentions in specialist press and the tabloids likely to be found gracing the brew tables in site cabins (that's not being snobbish about site cabins: I have a theory that the size of your newspaper reflects the amount of free time you have to read it, as well as the space to open it!).
I am referring, of course, to the affair of the blacklist of names held by the now-defunct Consulting Association prior to its seizure in 2009 by the Office of the Information Commissioner. A number of leading contractors have admitted using the services of the organisation, including for contracts on the Olympic sites, although they deny using it to blacklist workers.
Read more: Why the Government has left the investigation of blacklists to the Scots.