There is that well known saying that if you ‘Build It And They Will Come’, either Kevin Costner or the Bible, take your pick. Will Hutton has his own version….they are here, and they keep on coming, so build it. But he’s a bit coy about just who ‘they’might be.
Hutton and another worthy Lefty on the Today show (08:55) agreed that we must concrete over the Uk in order to meet our increasing housing needs. What wasn’t said was exactly why our housing needs are rising.
Let’s do the maths.
The usual figure quoted for the required annual housebuild is around 250,000 per year. In a remarkable coincidence this is near, well, quite a bit lower than, the figure for net immigration which is on an ever increasing surge….300,000 ‘flocking’ here last year.
Any possibility that the need for housing is related to the UK being swamped by immigrants?
Just who is going to pay for these houses and how are they going to pay for them, especially as Hutton thought it should be the Government….us and our taxes in other words?
The Today programme didn’t have time for the hard questions just the lovely touchy feely ‘let’s do something lovely’ narrative that is all the BBC comes up with these days.
Well technically Costner said “If you build it, he will come” – the phrase is getting like “You dirty rat” – never said by James Cagney, “Beam me up Scotty” – never said by James T Kirk and “Elementary my Dear Watson” – never written in any AC Doyle book
Thanks Arthur and welcome back to pedant’s corner, my favourite bit of the whole site 🙂
This week I tried to have a discussion with someone who is in favour of unrestricted immigration because of the economic benefits of an increased population.
I asked him if he took in a lodger – as he has a spare bedroom. To drive my point home I said that if he put in bunk beds he could fit in two lodgers, and if he could get them to “box and cox” he could get in four. Of course there would be a queue for the bathroom in the morning, the kitchen would be crowded at mealtimes and there might be arguments about what to watch on the main TV; but his family would be economically much better off with four lodgers paying him rent. If he wasn’t taking in lodgers for the extra money I didn’t see why he thought we should degrade the quality of life of everyone in Britain for the extra money he thought immigrants would contribute.
As of today he’s not talking to me.
That’s a brilliant analogy. I’m going to remember that. It might have made an impact on your interlocuter, and he may eventually reconsider in his own time. I find you have to pick and choose whose arguments you demolish. Some don’t take it too well.
With some it’s like a living ‘Groundhog Day’. Just as I tired of the film, I’ve tired of them.
Yes, it’s a brilliant analogy if your brain is made of cottage cheese. If the interlocutor had half a brain he would have told you to piss off and that comparing a country to a small house was absurd.
A halfwit argument used by halfwits.
Isn`t Hutton the Works Foundation grandee who`s doing rather well out of his charitable, do-gooding sentiments?
On a good salary, as he beats his breast over the graves of the poor-whilst selling them the diggers and shovels with a moist onion in his padded pockets?
Grade One Guardian hypocrite-providing answers to questions that only Highgate harpies give a foccacia about-since 1992, as I recall.
A perennial shoo-in for the BBC green rooms, as he blows hard into a lace-edged hankie.
Wills?…Self ,Straw and Hutton?….no deed of variation for THAT lot of monocultured priviledge.
Indeed he is and an expert with the rare distinction of rarely having been right about anything.
In other words, perfect for the BBC!
298 000 is the figure the Guardian printed yesterday as the net increase , so that’ll be the figure the BBC will take as gospel . Or should we now say as Koran ?
That’s about 800 a day. Doesn’t sound much , we should be able to find a place for them to sleep in this country . But we will need to find another 800 places again tomorrow, and another 800 the next day , and another 800 the day after , and for the rest of time , weekends and bank holidays included .
Finding a place to stay for the night is one thing , as though we could find a settee in someone’s gaff after a party . But human beings desire more than that for their lives , ie; they will want a home .
Well let’s give that of that 800 a day 4 will share a house , assuming they come in in nice tidy numbers such as a nuclear family . So that’s 200 houses per day every day , weekends , bank holidays, Christmas ,Ramadan , wintervil etc that will need completion .
Now I’m not a scientist, so I don’t know the carbon affect of these 800 per day , but I would like to know about the affects on water supply and sewerage.
I’m not a mathematician either but t he Guardian says that the immigrants contribute 8 billion to the economy , which means that each of the new 800 contributes over 26 000 by the end of the year .???
Personally I feel that if immigrants are so good then we should send them to Africa , as their countries need it more than us .
i mean,do they think we are all stupid and senile,yes the politacal buzz word is now if they get elected in may they all want to bulid more houses,very nice indeed if you are a immigrant coming here with the intention of having a large family living on welfare,but bob and emily who have 2 children can get back to the back of the que and damm well wait another 10 years on the housing list because you wont be no priority to any goverment in power except ukip.
Build it and they will come? Too true. The one and only thing that might possibly be deterring even more from coming here is high housing costs!
We already have the highest minimum wage in Europe.
We already have a freely accessed NHS
We already have one of the easiest to access benefit systems.
And perhaps worst of all, we speak the worlds lingua franca.
Do we also want to supply affordable housing to the invaders? No no no!