If some Conservative voters are reluctant to support the expansion of towns and villages, Liz Truss has a warning for them. “It’s a lot less uncomfortable having the field next to your house built on, than it is having your property appropriated by a bunch of Socialist-Marxists,’ said the Chief Secretary to the Treasury. She was giving the keynote speech at the Spectator Housing conference, sponsored by Lloyds, in London’s Southbank Centre yesterday and said in public what a lot of Tories have said in private: that the choice is between more housing, or a Corbyn government.
A choice, she said, that she’s taking at home as well as in Westminster. She said that there are “plans to build behind my house in Norfolk, which some people locally are opposing. And I refuse to do that, because you put your money where your mouth is. We have to support new development. Even if it is on the field that our house personally overlooks.”
She also made the argument for deregulation, so that cities can grow to face up against ‘the likes of Sao Paulo or Shanghai’ through building up and spreading out; for more cooperation with private firms to secure funding through partnerships; and for the bolder regeneration of existing infrastructure – ‘we’ve got Canary Wharf, now let’s have Canary North.’
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