“Fully expected and anticipated in opposition.” That is how Matthew Pennycook described the collapse in housing delivery this week, to a room of developers at UKREiiF in Leeds. On stage: ministers, panels, glossy brochures about unlocking delivery and the biggest affordable housing push in a generation. Off stage: Homes England emailing providers to say they […]
There was much relief when a ceasefire of sorts was announced earlier this week. But it doesn’t take a career in the Services to see that this conflict is not resolving cleanly for the United States and for the world. Initiated with unclear objectives, the US campaign has burned through significant resources targeting AI-identified assets—some
It is now increasingly clear that this conflict is not a short-lived shock despite the American President’s erratic social media activity sometimes suggesting otherwise. Recent commentary on Iran’s military doctrine highlights why. Rather than relying on a centralised command, Iran has deliberately fragmented its Revolutionary Guard into semi-autonomous units. The logic is simple: resilience. Even
On Monday morning President Trump published on his Truth Social platform “I AM PLEASE TO REPORT THAT THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, AND THE COUNTRY OF IRAN, HAVE HAD, OVER THE LAST TWO DAYS, VERY GOOD AND PRODUCTIVE CONVERSATIONS REGARDING A COMPLETE AND TOTAL RESOLUTION OF OUR HOSTILITIES IN THE MIDDLE EAST. BASED ON THE
How Lloydism risks detonating the master developer model, triggering a land strike, and leaving Britain’s housing pipeline in institutionalised purgatory I. The Doctrine That Survived Every Failure The December 2024 NPPF arrived with immediate effect, in its attempt to reset the planning landscape overnight. But in an irony the government did not intend, some of
In isolation, a drop in concrete sales might look like a cyclical blip — a short-term blip in construction commodity markets. In 2026, however, that description has become untenable. According to industry figures compiled by the Mineral Products Association (MPA), UK ready-mix concrete sales fell by 9.9 % across 2025, marking their lowest level in
We all love our festive traditions. Buying the tree, decorating the house and wrapping presents, all soundtracked by Wham! and Mariah Carey. In recent years we have added the unwrapping of a new National Planning Policy Framework into the mix as December now often brings a flurry of government announcements on planning. The Draft NPPF,
As the UK heads into the 2025 Budget, a paradox confronts the residential development funding sector: while debt markets are “ready and willing,” equity remains scarce. This “equity gap” is becoming frustratingly persistent and is evident from London’s major regeneration zones to regional growth hotspots. It is fundamentally reshaping how deals are originated, structured, and
Last week we saw another sign of the decapitalisation of the London residential development market with Peabody walking away from a major regeneration of over 500 homes in Ealing. We know the scale of the challenge in London. Thanks to Moilor, 281,000 planning permissions have been unimplemented across the Capital in schemes over 20 homes.
The UK housing development sector is being decapitalized. Evidence? The thousands of homes in static consents across Britain’s brownfield estate. Why is this happening? Three reasons: First a material misalignment between policy asks and what housing development can achieve. Second, the RICS viability process has been politicised. In many cases it is now hindering developers