The 50+ Blog

So, despite all the floods, policy is still to build houses in flood plains albeit after a risk assessment with the Environment Agency. This is incredibly short-sighted and downright stupid. Flood plains are fertile areas suitable for growing crops – oh, silly me, I forgot we have systematically destroyed our farming community over the last 20 years…

Now we are increasingly dependent on food from abroad, how environmentally friendly is that? Not too sensible from a self-sufficiency perspective either.

Back to the floods…

Don’t people understand that building houses increases risk of flooding in any given area as less land is available for natural drainage? The Environment Agency might regard some areas as high-risk and others as low-risk but the fact is with climate change all bets are off, no-one knows what’s likely to happen next. Infrastructure upgrades will be required wherever new houses are built to accommodate increasing demand for transport and further reducing the natural drainage.

Why do we need all these extra houses? Well, it’s mainly ‘affordable homes’ that are required for people employed in essential services whose incomes are so low they can’t afford ‘normal’ houses. So, we can’t afford to pay our nurses and teachers a decent salary? Or is it that house prices have risen so much that it’s almost impossible to get on the property ladder? Maybe the prices are going up so much because property has, traditionally, been the only reliable investment increasing in value at more than twice the average salary rise. It’s certainly my best (legal) bet for a decent pension.

Perhaps all the affordable housing has been gobbled up by immigrants the number of which we don’t know because it’s no-ones job to monitor this!

Sounds like the plot is well and truly lost to me, if there ever was one…