4 INDUSTRY NEWS
FROM THE EDITOR
James Parker
So the Competition and Markets Authority is refusing to turn its weaponry away from the issue of whether or not housebuilders are guilty of deliberate land banking. The CMA has producing its fi nal two ‘working papers’ detailing its current, very thorough investigation before it reports early next year on the issue.
The organisation has a broad reach, and is looking at 5,800 individual sites “held in the land banks of 11 of the largest housebuilders.” It revealed land in long-term land banks is equivalent to approximately 658,000 plots, while the “short-term land bank” equated to 522,000 plots.
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The CMA will report in the New Year, but so far, it says it has found that “land equivalent to over a million plots is held in land banks, in most areas by several different builders.” The CMA is “seeking feedback,” and in particular, whether local competition is being negatively impacted in the small number of areas where large amounts of developable land are controlled by a small number of housebuilders.
The CMA says it recognises that housebuilders “need to hold a pipeline of land as sites pass through the planning system, but added that it was “concerned that competition may be being distorted if land is held for longer and in larger quantities than is necessary.” The body is attempting to show that it recognises the logjams within the planning system, making recommendations on speeding the process, but is fi rmly focused on land banking at the same time as a perceived cause of slow supply of housing.
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The CMA’s Dan Turnbull commented that the organisation had “heard concerns that the way large housebuilders use land banks and complex planning rules may be harming competition and hold up the building of new homes.”
However the very existence of land banking continues to be refuted by major players within the industry, who instead say that delays at the planning end are to blame for failure to quickly build out sites. The CMA is seeking feedback from “key people in the industry, be that council planning departments, builders or landowners,” beore it publishes its fi nal fi ndings, and it will be intriguing to see how it counters objections.
Someone has to be right, either the large housebuilders are “sitting on land” they could be building on, or they’re not. It’s not an absolute though, if they are allowed to do so then some fi rms may, in these risk-averse times, be loath to build out sites they’re not sure they can sell.
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Another delay which is probably more welcome for some but concering for others is the Future Homes Standard consultation, which has secretly been pushed back to 2024. This will be less than a year before the standard is supposed to come into force. Given that it expects housebuilders to achieve 75+% carbon savings on new builds, and covers virtually every aspect of home construction, the industry needs the standard sooner rather than later if it’s to have a chance of being implemented in 2025.
James Parker
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