Out of Whitehall

While last week's Budget was most beneficial to pensioners, children and would-be athletes, there were several moves to further aid accessibility to home ownership. Chancellor Gordon Brown declared that £970m would be dedicated to shared equity housing, and invited housing associations, local authorities, builders and building societies to participate in its programme.

The government is aiming to pilot shared equity of just a 25% share. For private homebuyers, there is the small sweetener of a £5000 increase in the stamp duty threshold to £125,000.

The money for shared equity housing, which should provide 35,000 more homes, was greeted with scepticism by Sarah Webb, policy and practice director, Chartered Institute of Housing.

"It seems to be existing ODPM money reshuffled," she said.

Two more key concerns of the government are roulette tables and railways. Today marks the deadline for local authorities to submit a bid for a regional casino to the Casino Advisory Panel. Casinos are being touted as a regeneration winner, although some have voiced fears that they could have a degenerative effect (see feature, page 14).

Only one bidder stands to win the right to develop a regional casino, but the indications are that more will follow. That has been enough to prompt about 50 local authorities to fill the CAP's postbag with dazzling, leisure-led regeneration proposals worked up with their international casino-operator partners. The culture secretary will make the final decision on which authority will get a casino. Unsurprisingly, Blackpool is the hot favourite.

Railways have come to the fore as the government grapples with the need to provide the infrastructure to accompany housing growth. The chancellor said in the Budget that the next comprehensive spending review will include the government's response to its long-term review on transport.

To help finance infrastructure, the Treasury has proposed a planning gain supplement, but the consultation document has not been well received by industry. Meanwhile the ODPM and English Partnerships have come up with their own way of bringing in funding. The pair have joined forces to create an urban finance unit to help generate innovative financing solutions for infrastructure, along the lines of the "roof tax" being charged on all new homes built in Milton Keynes.

Speaking at Mipim earlier this month, EP chair Margaret Ford said: "The unit will be trying to use the leverage that we have." The move follows recent indications by Ford that EP would in future be focusing on ingenuity and innovation in infrastructure (see Regenerate February 2006).

The services of the new UFU could be in demand. Some may consider the Milton Keynes model to be a site-specific solution, but if that's the case, why are 10 cities around the UK talking to EP about how to develop a roof tax of their own?