Budget day came and went with little to trouble or please the built environment. A smattering of funds for redevelopment projects here and there, a few tax cuts for businesses – but no rabbits, no hats.  

While the chancellor Jeremy Hunt produced little to shout about, however, over at the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, Michael Gove was ploughing ahead with his latest grand project. The housing secretary used the fiscal event as an opportunity to quietly publish his 38-page vision for a radical transformation of one of the UK’s most historic cities.  

Gove first announced his intentions in a major housing speech last July, but the Case for Cambridge sets out his plans for the city for the first time in some detail.   

The task he has set himself is not a small one – particularly for a politician whose time in office may be quickly running out. A new urban quarter of more than 150,000 homes built in less than thirty years against the advice of the local council, the ardent opposition of the region’s rural Tory MP and in the face of severe environmental limitations. Can he possibly do it?