My latest piece in The Critic…
A cheery-looking chap from the local Lib Dems dropped a Focus leaflet through my door last weekend, the first political leaflet I’ve received since moving here a few months ago. It may surprise you that this isn’t the start of a Lib Dem-bashing article: while I no longer hold any fixed party allegiance for longer than the few seconds it takes to scrawl a cross in a box on polling day, I did put said cross beside the Lib Dem candidate’s name at December’s election and I broadly wish them well. So, I didn’t really expect to end up steaming with anger as I flipped through the pamphlet.
“Brace Yourselves: More Houses Are Coming” it thundered as it demanded that people write to the local Tory MP, Danny Kruger, asking why he supported the government’s proposals to reform the planning system. The leaflet acknowledged the “national housing need” but then talked about new homes as “the next storm”. Families having somewhere decent and secure to live is, apparently, comparable with a destructive weather event. Ironically, the leaflet heaped praise on NHS staff, many of whom are locked out of home ownership due to our acute housing shortage; praise never put a roof over anybody’s head.
I did indeed write to Kruger, but to congratulate the government on taking on the labyrinthine vested interests that have left Britain anywhere between a million and four million homes short, and with a wider national infrastructure that is decidedly spotty despite being world-leading at its best. I also uncovered an article by Kruger on ConservativeHomecalling for a major programme of building “beautiful” social housing that while thin on detail was stuffed with the right spirit.
I should really have thanked my local LibDem candidate. It can be a difficult for a politically minded cleric with a public record of decidedly non-rightwards politics to start a constructive relationship with a Tory constituency MP. It was a relief to be able to introduce myself to him with congratulations and common ground rather than sending him an angry missive on Brexit or the coronavirus that would get me perpetually filed in the “angry lefty vicar” dustbin.
My flat is part of a small social housing area which blends perfectly well with our very small village. Sadly I think the houses are all privately owned now and this must not happen again. However, trusting a Tory government to deliver under the present lot is to choose a blindfold. And the LibDems split the opposition.