THE CONSERVATIVE GOVERNMENT:

INSIGHT FOR THE PROPERTY & CONSTRUCTION INDUSTRY

INTRODUCTION

THE NEW DCLG

TEAM

- SECRETARY OF STATE

- MINISTERS

- SPECIAL ADVISERS

THE CONSERVATIVE

MANIFESTO:

KEY POLICIES FOR

THE PROPERTY AND

CONSTRUCTION

INDUSTRY

- THE ECONOMY

- HOUSING AND

PLANNING

- INFRASTRUCTURE

- DEVOLUTION

- EUROPE

- BUSINESS RATES

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Introduction

It’s often said that the property and construction sector is the bellwether of the UK’s

economic growth. With the new Conservative Government’s laser-like focus on delivering

their long-term economic plan, this sector is going to be lively over the next five years.

Industry data following the General Election signalled a rebound in the sector’s output, which

remained low over the past 22 months up to April. Many commentators believed this to be a

signal of nervousness ahead of a potential Labour Government. Although UK building and

property firms will be, on the whole, relieved at the outcome on 7th May, the sector remains

affected by the instability of macro-economic developments.

With a new team at the helm of the Department for Communities and Local Government and

a raft of policy plans in the Tory manifesto, PLMR takes a look at the Conservatives’ policy

concerning planning, property and construction, and their broader economic, infrastructure

and devolution policies.

The New DCLG Team

A new Government brings with it a new ministerial team at the Department for Communities and

Local Government. Please find below a summary of who’s who at DCLG.

Rt Hon Dr Greg Clark MP (Tunbridge Wells)

Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government

Greg has been promoted to the Cabinet from the role of Minister for Cities at the

Cabinet Office. He has also previously held the roles of Minister of State for

Decentralisation and Financial Secretary to the Treasury, under the Coalition

Government.

Greg was first elected to Parliament in 2005. Greg previously worked for the Boston Consulting Group,

before becoming Special Advisor to the Secretary of State for Trade & Industry (the Rt Hon Ian Lang

MP) between 1996 and 1997. He also worked for the BBC between 1997 and 2001, as Chief Adviser

and then Controller for Commercial Policy. Previously a Social Democrat, Greg joined the Conservative

Party in 1992. Greg was the Director of Policy for the Conservative Party from March 2001 for three

successive party leaders - William Hague, Iain Duncan Smith and Michael Howard.

Prior to entering Parliament, Greg was a councillor in Westminster for three years (2002-05), and is

very familiar with the running of local government.

In his role as Minister for Cities, Greg spoke on a number of occasions in Parliament about regional

growth (including the work of the Regional Growth Fund and Local Enterprise Partnerships) and

infrastructure across the UK.

According to the Local Government Chronicle, Greg’s appointment means that ‘devolution and a focus

on cities will be at the heart of the government’s agenda’, given his experience and expertise in these

areas.

Indeed, less than two months into his role, Greg has already been a strong advocate of devolution, to

cities and beyond. He recognises that counties and towns can also be significant hubs of growth, and

is keen to ensure that each area adopts an approach to devolution which is tailored to the locality.

Born in Middlesbrough, educated at a non-fee-paying school and the son of a milkman, Greg does not

have a typical background for a Conservative politician and has been described as being an

“economically liberal Conservative with a social conscience”.

Ministers

Brandon Lewis MP (Great Yarmouth)

Minister of State for Housing and Planning

Brandon has been re-appointed Minister of State for Housing and Planning, a

position he was first appointed to in July 2014. Howeve,er he will now be

attending Cabinet and will be granted his own Special Adviser (a perk usually

reserved for Secretaries of State) – both are signs of much more important

housebuilding is going to be in this Parliament.

Brandon was Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the Department for Communities and Local

Government from September 2012, having been elected as MP for Great Yarmouth in 2010.

Brandon is a qualified barrister and a former company director. Before joining the government,

Brandon was an active member of a number of All Party Parliamentary Groups, including those for

enterprise zones and local growth as well as local government. He was co-chair of a group on coastal

erosion and continues to work with colleagues who represent other coastal towns to highlight

common issues in their constituencies. He also served on Brentwood Borough Council for more than

10 years, with five as leader.

As Minister of State for Housing and Planning Brandon is responsible for:

- Housing (including Ebbsfleet) - Planning policy - Neighbourhood planning - Lead minister on the Housing Bill - Planning casework

Mark Francois MP (Rayleigh and Wickford)

Minister of State for Communities and Resilience

Mark has been appointed Minister of State for Communities and Resilience. Mark

comes to this position for his previous role of Minister of State for the Armed

Forces. He has also previously held the roles of Minster for Defence Personnel,

Welfare and Veterans, Vice-Chamberlain of the Household, Shadow Minister for

Europe and Shadow Economic Secretary to the Treasury.

Before embarking on his political career, Mark worked as a management trainee with Lloyds Bank,

before working in the lobbying industry and setting up his own agency.

Mark has been the MP for Rayleigh and Wickford since 2001 and he lists housing as one of his political

interests. He was previously a member of Basildon District Council, and served as Vice-Chairman of

the council’s Housing Committee for three years.

Mark has previously opposed housing plans in his constituency, with his opposition contributing to a

scaling back of housing plans from a development of 1,800 houses in Rochford to 550 proposed

properties. Given that this is his first planning related position in Government, it is yet to be seen what

this means for planning and housing on a national scale.

As Minister of State for Communities and Resilience, Mark’s remit includes:

- overview of local government policy and finance - deregulation - lead minister on the Devolution Bill - coastal communities and Thames Gateway - departmental finance and corporate issues - Minister for Portsmouth - fire and resilience

Marcus Jones MP (Nuneaton)

Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Minister for Local Government)

Marcus has been appointed Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Minister for

Local Government) in the post-election reshuffle.

Marcus worked as a conveyancing manager for a local firm of solicitors for 11 years

until his election. He had no obvious involvement in politics until 2005 when he was elected to

Nuneaton and Bedworth Council. He became leader of the Conservative group a year later, and in

2008 became the first Conservative leader of the council.

He won the marginal Nuneaton back from Labour after 18 years with a swing of more than 10 per cent

in 2010. In 2013 he was appointed to his first government post as Parliamentary Private Secretary to

the Financial Secretary to the Treasury, Sajid Javid. He was subsequently appointed small business

ambassador to the West Midlands by the Prime Minister. Marcus then followed Mr Javid in 2014 when

he was appointed Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport.

Marcus chaired the All-Party Group on Town Centres, and objected strongly to the publication of Crap

Towns which in 2013 named Nuneaton and the eighth worst place to live in Britain, based on a readers’

poll. He challenged the editors to accompany him on a tour of the town, extolling its “vibrant

economy”.

In his role as Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Minister for Local Government), Marcus is

responsible for:

- local government policy, including adult social care and children’s services - local government finance - homelessness - community rights, including community pubs - high streets, town centres and markets - welfare reform - supporting minister on the Housing Bill - planning casework

James Wharton MP (Stockton South)

Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Minister for Local Growth and the Northern

Powerhouse)

James has been appointed Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Minister for Local

Growth and the Northern Powerhouse).

A former solicitor, James was selected for the Stockton South seat in 2007 and elected to Parliament

as the youngest Conservative MP in 2010, aged 26. In 2013 he came top of the ballot for Private

Members’ Bills and took up a Bill drafted by the party leadership to enshrine in law a referendum on

continuing EU membership, to be held in 2017. In spite of heavy delaying tactics by Labour and Liberal

Democrat MPs. the Bill passed all its House of Commons stages in November 2013. But it was killed

off through a lack of time after a large number of amendments in the House of Lords. However, his

handling of the Bill won him The House magazine’s ‘rising star’ award.

James has held office on the All-Party Group on Sri Lanka, where he went on four sponsored visits in

the space of nine months. He is also interested in defence matters and economic regeneration.

In the 2015 election he increased his perilous 332 majority to 5,046, and was rewarded with his current

role. He is pro-devolution, which is likely to have contributed to his being given his current brief.

In his role as Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Minister for Local Government), James is

responsible for:

- supporting the Secretary of State on City Deals - European Regional Development Fund - enterprise zones and local enterprise partnerships - building regulations - supporting minister on the Devolution Bill - planning casework

Baroness Williams of Trafford

Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government

Baroness Williams was appointed Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the

Department for Communities and Local Government in May 2015. She is a

Conservative member of the House of Lords having been raised to the peerage in

2013.

Baroness Williams was a councillor on Trafford Metropolitan Borough Council between 1998 and

2011, serving as leader of the Conservative group between 2002 and 2009 and as Council Leader

between 2004 and 2009. She was raised to the peerage in 2013.

Baroness Williams was a non-executive director of the North West Development Agency between

2007 and 2011 and was the North West Chair of the Heritage Lottery Fund between 2011 and 2012.

She has also served on the board of the Central Salford Urban Regeneration Company and as a

member of the Greater Manchester Police Authority. More recently she was a director of the North

West Rail Campaign and executive director of Atlantic Gateway.

The Baroness is responsible for:

- departmental business in the House of Lords - local government finance and policy - integration and faith - HS2 - Travellers - supporting the Secretary of State on City Deals and Troubled Families - women and equalities, including race equality (supporting the Department for Education in

the Lords)

On 28 May 2015, Baroness Williams introduced the Cities and Local Government Devolution Bill to the

House of Lords.

Special Advisers

Jacob Willmer,

Special Adviser to Greg Clark

Jacob has been appointed Special Adviser to the newly appointed Secretary of State

for Communities and Local Government, Greg Clark. Jacob is the special adviser

responsible for press and media relations. He previously worked with Clark whilst he

was minister of state for universities, science and cities.

Jacob worked for the Conservative Party as a press officer from 2008 to 2013 having graduated from

Brunel University with a BSc in Sports and Exercise Science. In March 2013 he joined communications

company Albany Associates Ltd. In this role he travelled to Africa to work as the Kismayo regional team

leader in the UN information support team for Somalia and the communications adviser to the Prime

Minister of Somalia.

In November 2014 Jacob joined the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills as a special adviser.

Meg Powell-Chandler,

Special Adviser to Greg Clark

Meg has been appointed Special Adviser to the newly appointed Secretary of

State for Communities and Local Government, Greg Clark.

Meg studied Modern History and Politics at the University of Oxford and

graduated in 2009. In October 2010 she joined the Conservative Party as a

Political Adviser, and was promoted to Head of Briefing (a senior role that was

once held by a young David Cameron) in October 2012. She then joined 10 Downing Street as a Special

Adviser in 2013 and played an important role in preparing the Prime Minister for Prime Minister’s

Questions each week.

Jackie Sadek,

Special Adviser to Greg Clark

Jackie has been appointed Special Adviser to the newly appointed Secretary of

State for Communities and Local Government, Greg Clark. She was a policy adviser

to Mr Clark in his role as Minister for Cities.

Jackie is an urban land developer. She started her career at the London Docklands Development

Corporation, before joining Stanhope plc. In the 1990s she joined the site acquisition team at Tesco plc

and then joined Paddington Regeneration Partnership. From 2007 to 2010 she served as head of

regeneration for CBRE Group.

The Conservative Manifesto – Key Policies for the Property and

Construction Industry

The Economy

The Conservatives have outlined a two-phase reduction plan to take the deficit.

Phase One

Continue to reduce government spending by 1% each year, in real terms.

This will require a further £30 billion in fiscal consolidation:

• £13bn from savings made across departments

• £12bn on saving made on welfare

• £5bn raised from tackling tax avoidance and evasion

Phase Two

• From 2018, Britain is set to move into surplus for the first time in 18 years

• Government spending will continue to be controlled, no longer cutting it in real terms, but

instead growing it in line with inflation

• From 2019-20, spending would grow in line with GDP

The upcoming Budget and the Spending Review in the Autumn will provide further detail of the £30

billion in fiscal consolidation, with the cuts to the welfare budget already proving the most

controversial.

Housing & Planning

The Conservatives have announced a variety of policies which directly impact the housing, property

and construction sector.

Renting

• Ensure that 18-21 year-olds on Jobseeker’s Allowance will no longer have an automatic

entitlement to housing benefit.

• Implement the requirement for all landlords to check the immigration status of their

tenants.

Social Housing

• Introduce a new residency requirement for social housing, so that EU migrants cannot be

considered for a council house unless they have been living in an area for at least four years.

Housing – Ownership

• Extend the ‘right to buy’ for 1.3 million families living in housing association properties. These

tenants will have the offer of a discount on their property capped at just over £102,700 in

London and £77,000 for the rest of England. This will be funded by requiring local authorities

to manage their housing assets more efficiently, with the most expensive properties sold off

and replaced as they fall vacant.

• Build more homes that people can afford, including 200,000 new Starter Homes exclusively

for first-time buyers under 40. These would be sold at a 20% below the market price.

• Build an additional 275,000 affordable homes by 2020. They will offer 10,000 new homes to

rent at below market rates.

• Extend Help to Buy to cover another 120,000 homes – in total helping over 200,000 people.

They would continue the Help to Buy mortgage guarantee until the start of 2017, and the

Help to Buy equity loan until at least 2020.

Housing – Supply

• Protect the Green Belt.

• Create a Brownfield Fund to

unlock homes on brownfield land

for additional housing.

• Require local authorities to have a

register of what is available, and

ensure that 90 per cent of

suitable brownfield sites have planning permission for housing by 2020.

• Fund Housing Zones to transform brownfield sites into new housing, which will create

95,000 new homes.

• To meet the capital’s housing needs, the London Land Commission would identify and

release all surplus brownfield land owned by the public sector.

• Double the number of custom-built and self-built homes by 2020, and they plan to take

forward a new Right to Build, requiring councils to allocate land to local people to build or

commission their own home, as is possible in most of Europe.

• Support locally-led garden cities and towns and prioritise brownfield development, making

sure new homes are always matched by the necessary infrastructure to support them - such

as in Ebbsfleet and Bicester.

• Simplify and speed up the neighbourhood planning system, to support communities that

seek to meet local housing and other development needs through neighbourhood planning.

• Require local authorities to dispose of high-value vacant council houses which would help

fund the Right to Buy extension discounts and the building of more affordable homes in the

area

• To provide the necessary statutory framework to support the delivery of Starter Homes

• Just last week, Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG) chief planner

Steve Quartermain said that his ministerial team are not currently intending on revisiting or

reforming the 2012 National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF).

Infrastructure

In its manifesto, the Conservative Party committed to delivering its National Infrastructure Plan (which

seeks to address the infrastructure needs of the UK) which includes investments in the road network,

rail network, superfast broadband provision, scientific research and flood protection. This is

underpinned by over £460 billion of planned public and private investment.

Rail Network

• £38bn investment in the railway network in the five years to 2019. However, just last week it

was announced the government will delay this modernisation project because rising costs

and missed targets make the ambitious plan unsustainable. Work on the Great Western

Mainline will go ahead, while the plans for the Midland main line and the Leeds to

Manchester Line will be suspended.

It is therefore unclear when or ever if the following (previously outlined by the Conservatives) will

take place:

• Electrify the railways – plans to extend the current programme from the North, Midlands,

and South Wales to East Anglia and the South West

• Complete the construction of the new east-west Crossrail across Greater London, and push

forward with plans for Crossrail 2, a new rail route running through London and connecting

Surrey and Hertfordshire

• Fit trains with new Wi-Fi equipment and improve mobile phone signals

• Freeze rail fares in real terms for the whole of the next Parliament – regulated fares would

only be able to rise by Retail Price Inflation, and train operating companies would not have

any flexibility to raise ticket prices above this.

• Introduce a smart ticketing and part-time

season tickets and require train companies

to improve compensation arrangements for

passengers when trains are more than a

few minutes late.

Road Network

• Invest £15bn in roads, which includes over

£6bn in the northern road network

• Add 1,300 extra lane miles to the roads.

• Double the number of journeys made by bicycle and invest over £200 million to make cycling

safer.

High street retail

Support Business Improvement Districts (BIDs) and other forms of business-led collaboration on high streets – giving more say to local traders on issues such as minor planning applications, cleaning and parking.

Devolution

The Conservatives have pledged to implement the Smith Commission and devolve power to Scotland,

Wales, Northern Ireland, and England.

Scotland

• A new Scotland Bill was announced in the Queen’s Speech last month.

• Implement the recommendations of the Smith Commission so that more than 50 per cent of

the Scottish Parliament’s budget would be funded from revenues raised in Scotland and it

would have significant new welfare powers.

• Retain the Barnett formula.

• Ensure that where responsibility for taxation has been devolved, tax changes only affect

public spending in that part of the country.

• Nicola Sturgeon has demanded that Cameron goes further and grants Scotland full fiscal

autonomy.

Wales

• Devolve to the Welsh Assembly control over its own affairs.

• Introduce a new Wales Bill if proposed changes require legislation.

• Introduce a ‘funding floor’ to protect Welsh relative funding and provide certainty for the

Welsh Government to plan for the future, once it has called a referendum on Income Tax

powers in the next Parliament.

England

• Give English MPs a veto over English-only matters, including on Income Tax, whilst ensuring

that MPs from all parts of the UK continue to deliberate and vote together, including to set

overall spending levels.

• Change parliamentary procedure so that the detail of legislation affecting only England or

England and Wales will be considered by a Committee drawn in proportion to party strength

in England or England and Wales.

• Add a new stage to how English legislation is passed; no bill or part of a bill relating only to

England would be able to pass to its Third Reading and become law without being approved

through a legislative consent motion by a Grand Committee made up of all English MPs, or

all English and Welsh MPs.

• Extend the principle of English consent to financial matters such as how spending is

distributed within England and to taxation when the equivalent decisions have been

devolved to Scotland. Northern Ireland

• Work to implement the Stormont House Agreement to enable devolution to function more

effectively; to deal with the legacy of the past; and to make progress on divisive issues such

as flags and parading.

• Continue to work with the Northern Ireland Executive to implement commitments in the

2013 economic pact to rebalance the economy and to build a more united and stronger

society.

• Complete the devolution of Corporation Tax powers to the Assembly.

Europe

• An in-out referendum on Europe has been promised by the end of 2017

• The choice will be between a renegotiated settlement between the EU and the UK, and

leaving

• Prime Minister David Cameron is currently negotiating with European leaders, and only last

week set out his reform demands at European Council meeting, which he called a

“significant milestone” in his plans

Business Rates

• Conduct a major review into business rates by the end of 2015 to ensure that from 2017

they properly reflect the structure of the economy and provide clearer billing, better

information sharing and a more efficient appeal system. However, expectations should be

managed - intel from the Conservative party reveals that businesses should not expect

anything radical from the Government’s review of business rates.

• Increase the business rates retail discount to £1,500.

• Build on the local retention of business rates introduced in 2012, promote localism by

allowing councils to keep a higher proportion of the business rates revenue that is generated

in their area. In Cambridgeshire, Greater Manchester and Cheshire East, the Conservatives

will pilot allowing local councils to retain 100% of growth in business rates.