Good morning,
A new tax on residential developers will claw back £2bn over ten years(£) to pay for cladding remediation. The levy will be launched in 2022, alongside a further tax(£) on future high-rise developments.
The levy has been cautiously welcomed(£) by developers, even as the news wiped more than £1.6bn off the value of Britain’s biggest housebuilders.
The FT (£) says that housebuilders won’t be fazed by the cladding crisis, as Persimmon sets aside £75m to pay for cladding remediation(£) in its legacy portfolio.
Backbench Tory MPs, however, have called the decision to issue loans for lower-rise properties instead of grants a “betrayal” and an example of “shocking incompetence”(£).
Meanwhile, The Guardian looks at what the £3.5bn fund will actually be able to achieve, given the scale of the problem is estimated to be close to £15bn.
The government is stripping more than £1bn from the flagship green home improvements scheme(£) it set up less than two years ago, despite uptake being limited only by the achingly slow release of funds.
And Robert Jenrick is facing mounting opposition from high street businesses over plans to allow town centres to convert to housing(£) without planning.
Incidentally, the UK’s hot housing market actually cooled at the start of the year, according to a RICS survey.
And London office take up for 2020 was just 4.9m sq ft, down 60% on 2019, according to the latest LOMA. But things picked up towards the end of the year, with transactions in Q4 almost matching the previous three months at £3.5bn.
The carrots don’t seem to be advancing the diversity agenda, writes EG’s editor. Time to bring out the sticks.
The credibility of the governor of the Bank of England is at risk due to his continuing clash(£) with Dame Elizabeth Gloster over whether or not he tried to censor her damning report.
The British Retail Consortium has called for “crucial” support for retailers(£) in next month’s budget.
Cain International will jettison 22 Prezzo restaurants(£) in a pre-pack administration(£).
The eviction of protestors from tunnels dug beside Euston Square can continue, a judge has ordered.
And as the Senate continues to hear evidence, Palm Beach town council has ruled that Donald Trump can live permanently at Mar-a-Lago, after less than half an hour of debate.
Meanwhile, the mansion the Rose family are evicted from in the first episode of Schitt’s Creek has been put on the market at C$15m. The town of Schitt’s Creek is not for sale.
And finally, a Swiss economist has the answer to the hordes of tourists that overrun Venice each year (pandemics permitting): Build another Venice(£). Bruno Frey has written a book detailing his cunning plan, which would involve building a second St Mark’s Square – called Mark 2, naturally -as well as 100 other sites across the world that suffer from over-tourism. “In Venice it’s almost impossible to take a halfway decent selfie in the crowds,” he writes. But far from the tacky copies familiar to visitors to Las Vegas and Disney World, Frey says the replicas would be high-tech “new originals”, which would become the first choice to visit for many people. As Venice is currently reeling from a 71.5% slump in tourist numbers thanks to Covid, it is unlikely La Serenissima will take up the offer anytime soon.
