Rt. Hon Oliver Letwin MP: Affordable Housing

You only have to look down the Front Page to see how busy we've been, and during the next few days, equally as busy,if not even more so.A lot of high points, and if I'm to single anything out, I would start with the talk to the LRDT on the subject of Affordable Housing by our esteemed local MP, the Rt.Hon Oliver Letwin. Was a good speech, lucid, humorous, Oliver is a natural crowd pleaser, and based his talk on the 'good news', and the 'bad news'. The good news being that its possible to create social housing in Dorset, the bad news is that none of the current legislation can be applied to Lyme Regis. Oliver suggests the real cause is that "you live in a very lovely place". This part is very true, and probably explains why he spends so much time here himself. (He is back in town on Saturday to dedicate the new Polish War Memorial in Anning Road, an event we'll be recording with Ken Whetlor). Being such a lovely place creates a multiple problem. Not just the lack of 'Affordable' housing, or a lack of housing for people who work in the town, but house prices pushed up mercilessly by the second homers who don't live here, and an increasing lack of hotel accomodation for holidaymakers. All of this is bad for the local economy. So its a let down and a disappointment that what works for Buckland Newton, (Mr. Letwin's prime example) population 600, doesn't help Lyme Regis, population closer to 3,800.I'm not sure, as far as ordinary working people are concerned, if any house in the UK is 'affordable' any more. If the national average for obtaining a mortgage is around 7 times the Annual Income, then home owning is impossible for most people. I'm not sure how many barstaff/shop/care or hotel and seasonal workers earn 35 grand a year, but thats what most work in Lyme is about! (unless you manage to land a plum job with Pip Evans?). In short, Lyme these days is much more a place to live than a place to work, and if hotels continue closing, it won't even be a place to visit.Oliver is in a difficult postion really, he represents the party that decided in the 80's to sell off all the social housing in the country, on the basis that everyone should aspire to own their own house, and everyone can afford to. The result of that legislation is that we are faced with an overwhelming shortage of housing, worse than at any point in UK history. I don't entirely blame the Tories, some of the problem is caused by immigration, much of which is caused by bombing people out of their own countries. Worth saying at this point that Oliver was a strong supporter of sending British Troops to Iraq. Last question Oliver was asked at the LRDT meeting, was whether with the benefit of hindsight, would he still support his parties policy on Social Housing in the 80's. Apparently he does. (No one asked him if he still supported the war in Iraq). The question I would like to ask is about the growing public feeling towards taking Green Belt land to build houses on (featured I think on You and Yours BBC Radio 4 this week?). Whats his policy on this?With all that said, I'd just like to add that Oliver Letwin works very hard for his constituency, we seem to come across him everywhere these days, and I quite enjoyed his talk.
In terms of politics and parties however, I recommend Guy Fawkes.