The last night of ippr's Liberal Democrat events saw us joined by Lembit Opik, Spokesperson for Housing and Segway enthusiast.
Lembit highlighted that we are in a time when more people are living alone, we have more households, and we have a growing population, all of which are contributing to the housing problems in the UK.
He spoke of developing partnerships within local communities between government, developers, and the community in order to give the communities the housings they need. However, according to panelist David Tuffin, local engagement often fails due to the lack of professionalism in planning departments, with poor wages and overworked employees delivering poor results in housing.
Tuffin brought a technical point of view to the panel, and said there is no point building cheap houses for high profits, as people will end up paying more in the long run while developers continue to make profits.
The debate went back to Lembit, who proposed that central government give money to local authorities for social housing in order to stimulate the affordable housing market and create positive equity for local authorities.
Addressing the social element of the housing issue was Heather Petch from the Housing Associations Charitable Trust. She highlighted the urgency in the need for a boost in housing supply, and added that we cannot possibly address other pressing social problems without adequate housing.
She also added that there is a problem with the isolation of housing from other services. This 'silo approach', particularly the separation of housing from education and health, is limiting outcomes in this area.
We weren't at all expecting a karate demo.
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