• Bookstore

Speaking on Sunday AM this morning, Gordon Brown spoke about his vision of a ?home-owning, asset-owning, wealth-owning democracy? and set out his proposals to build five new eco-towns, increase the stock of affordable housing for young families, and social housing available for rent.

?A home-owning, asset-owning, wealth-owning democracy is what would be in the interests of our country because everybody would have a stake in the country. The problem is that even with the great ambitions of the 1950s or the 1980s, they did not succeed in widening the scope for home ownership to large numbers of people who want it. There is a pent up demand. More households are being created than there are houses for them. But I also recognise you have got to combine the building of housing for ownership with the building of houses for rent in a far more mobile and fluid society. I recognise that there is a challenge of modern society where young people want to buy or rent their own homes a lot earlier than previously. We have got to make it possible for that to happen. The aim is affordable housing.?

The 5 new eco-towns, each housing between 10,000 and 20,000 new homeowners, will be built primarily on brownfield land. Each new home with be built to zero-carbon standards, allowing them to qualify for a zero rate of stamp duty, all the energy and electricity they use will be generated locally from sustainable sources, and they will all be built with strong public transport infrastructure. They will include new state-of-the-art zero carbon schools and health centres.

The first such proposed town will be located on a brownfield site, the abandoned Oakington Barracks in Cambridgeshire, and will include 10,000 new homes, with electricity delivered by solar and wind power.

It remains to be seen how Mr Brown will manage distribution to first-time buyers, especially as houses that have previously been earmarked for keyworkers have still ended up on the open market or costing more than ?affordable?.