It discussed the current housing crisis which is crippling the UK and Clarke launched his campaign to instigate a ‘Council Housing Revolution’ to remedy the problem.

The low rate of council house construction since the 1980s, alongside the selling-off of social housing without replacement has ensured that the availability of council houses has catastrophically dropped. The programme argued that more must be done to ensure the security, safety and prosperity of the British people who are still on lengthy waiting lists for social housing.

The programme has acted as a call to arms for support of Clarke’s movement to get the government to build 100,000 decent quality council houses every year. He has further argued that England and Northern Ireland should follow the example of Scotland and Wales and suspend the Right to Buy scheme which entitles council house residents the right to buy their homes after living in them for three years. 

George Clarke spent a large portion of the programme highlighting the poor living conditions of the temporary accommodation which has been provided to deal with the crisis. Such housing often falls beneath the 39 square metres requirement of space by law and are simply not good enough for people to live in.

In response to the programme, the National Federation of Builders argued that Clarke’s discussion of this issue has failed to address how the localism prevents such houses from being constructed. It argued that if the UK Government supported Clarke’s petition, which was received by the House Builders Association, it would have to remove a substantial amount of the planning powers given to local councils. There is substantial political pressure on councils to meet the targets associated with Housing Delivery Tests brought in by the government to speed up the process of building houses.

The National Federation of Builders further argued that local councils already have the power and often the land to build more social housing. However, housing associations, independent builders and community land trusts have often complained that obtaining planning permission is exceedingly difficult, even if the development site is included in local housing initiative plans.

Accordingly, the head of housing and planning policy at the House Builders Association, Rico Wojtulewicz, said that the only way 246,000 houses were built this year was because permitted development and Homes England removed political and strategic pressures from local planners. He argued that the only “realistic way” to build three million houses over the next thirty years is to take planning powers away from the councils.

The programme is available to watch here.