Britain's Broken Housing Market
The Briefing Room
BBC
4.8 • 731 Ratings
🗓️ 2 March 2017
⏱️ 29 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The government says the housing market is broken and that it's holding the country back. As prices have risen, fewer people are able to get on the housing ladder, and more are now renting privately later into their lives.
Many argue we're not building enough new homes. But is that the only problem? David Aaronovitch speaks to a panel of experts to find out and travels to Bristol to see what effect the housing crisis is having on the way people live there.
Contributors:
Dame Kate Barker, economist and author of a government review on housing supply
Lindsay Judge, Senior Research and Policy Analyst at the Resolution Foundation
Emma Maier, Editor, Inside Housing
Councillor Paul Smith, Labour cabinet member for homes, Bristol City Council
Producer: Phil Kemp Researcher: Sam Bright Editor: Innes Bowen.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This is the BBC. |
| 0:03.3 | Welcome to the briefing room with me, David Oronovich. |
| 0:06.7 | Last month, the government set out its strategy for mending what it called the broken housing market. |
| 0:12.4 | In this episode, we asked what broke it and why it matters. |
| 0:25.7 | The government has called the housing market broken. |
| 0:30.1 | There are many striking statistics illustrating that brokenness, |
| 0:34.8 | but you can't do graphs on the radio unless you're Neil Rizel, |
| 0:37.7 | the father of the BBC radio-audiographic. |
| 0:39.0 | Here he is. |
| 0:44.2 | Say a couple on low to middle income is saving for a house. |
| 0:48.0 | They're able to put aside 5% of their wages. |
| 0:55.8 | Each coin drop represents one year they'd have to save for an average-sized deposit. In the 1990s, it took... |
| 1:00.7 | The couple would have to save for three years, before they could throw a housewarming party |
| 1:06.4 | in their first home. |
| 1:10.2 | What about today? |
| 1:11.6 | Remember, each coin drop is a year of saving. |
| 1:20.3 | Today it would take a couple 24 years to save for an average house deposit. |
| 1:26.4 | A couple starting in their late 20s could look forward to throwing their housewarming party |
| 1:31.3 | in their 50s. |
| 1:33.3 | Well done. |
| 1:42.3 | That's buying. It's also getting tougher for people who are renting. |
| 1:48.0 | Nearly one million more households with children rent privately than a decade ago, |
... |
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