Following the news that the government plans to relax planning restrictions to allow more homes to be built, Ben Southwood made these delighted comments:

“Hurrah for Sajid Javid, as he proposes to drop light restrictions in order to build more terraces and mansion blocks.

"Cities do not need to be like Hong Kong to give everyone decent living space at reasonable rents: places like Paris and Barcelona are far denser than Oxford, Manchester or London, without being dystopian. Inner London itself has shed people since we replaced its terraces with towers, and those that remain are widely sought after.

“Javid and the government must push ahead with these reforms and more, including building on a small fraction of the Green Belt, so Britain’s cities can look more like central Paris and less like suburban Moscow."

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