Taylor Wimpey chief exec calls for evidence as major review kicks off

Planning Houses

Pete Redfern, the chief executive of Taylor Wimpey, has launched his independent review into the decline of home ownership.

Speaking at a launch event in London today, Redfern said his review would report by this September on how to return England to a “sustainable level of home ownership”.

The review has been commissioned by the Labour party but is independent and will not be funded by Labour.

Home ownership is now at its lowest level for nearly three decades and Redfern’s review will investigate the reasons behind this decline and suggest policies to reverse the trend.

He will be supported by an expert panel of advisers including Terrie Alafat, chief executive of the Chartered Institute of Housing and a former senior housing civil servant, Dame Kate Barker, former Bank of England MPC member, Andy Gray, former MD of mortgages at Barclays, and Ian Mulheirn, director at Oxford Economics.

Redfern said Barker would publish a “mini update” to her influential 2004 study on housing supply as part of his review.

He added the review would look to promote home ownership as “part of a broad housing market with a broad mix of tenures”. He also called on the industry to submit evidence to the review.

John Healey, Labour’s shadow housing and planning minister, who commissioned the review, said he hoped it would “give us all fresh analysis and ideas” and was “not just for Labour policy formation”.

He added: “Most of us aspire to own our own home, yet there is an increasing divide between the housing haves and have-nots.”

For further information visit the website http://www.redfernreview.org/