37 minutes ago, royal white said:

Following on from the benefits post. 
 

 

I took voluntary redundancy at Christmas, construction is in recession with little new work coming through. The company's turnover was down one third in the last published accounts and will be more depressed in the next, margins dropping too. Quite a few bubbles bursting and companies going under.

9 minutes ago, Dimron said:

I took voluntary redundancy at Christmas, construction is in recession with little new work coming through. The company's turnover was down one third in the last published accounts and will be more depressed in the next, margins dropping too. Quite a few bubbles bursting and companies going under.

How is the Labour government getting on with its plans for 10 gazillion new houses? I haven't heard much about it recently.

7 minutes ago, Zulu said:

How is the Labour government getting on with its plans for 10 gazillion new houses? I haven't heard much about it recently.

From Gov.UK Official February Stats, you use bricks and blocks to build new homes:

1.1 Headline findings

Headline findings in this edition of the publication are that:

• deliveries of bricks decreased by 6.7% in December 2025 compared with December 2024
• deliveries of blocks decreased by 17.3% in December 2025 compared with December 2024

But, but they promised.

10 minutes ago, Zulu said:

But, but they promised.

Just like their budget for growth

1 hour ago, Dimron said:

Just like their budget for growth

Quite. 😀

7 hours ago, Lt. Aldo Raine said:

@kent_white - any idea what's going on here?

Why are there so many overpayments and why are the NHS Trusts so shit at managing them?

 

A lot of it is when people leave the trust but still have outstanding accounts with them. 

For example - I had a bike on bike to work with the local NHS Trust and forgot all about it until I got a letter from a debt collector. 

I thought it had been calculated at the end of my employment and subtracted. 

So I'm not sure it's that people are accidentally getting too much money put into their accounts per se. 

It'll be things like when you get a car through the NHS etc, on a salary sacrifice. That kind of thing, I'd imagine.

4 hours ago, Dimron said:

I took voluntary redundancy at Christmas, construction is in recession with little new work coming through. The company's turnover was down one third in the last published accounts and will be more depressed in the next, margins dropping too. Quite a few bubbles bursting and companies going under.

We've let 40% of our staff go since December. Around 800 people. And that's just in the NHS in Greater Manchester. It's being replicated across the whole of the UK. 

Plus NHS England has been dissolved. So there's 18,000 people now looking for work straight away!

3 hours ago, Zulu said:

But, but they promised.

Net addition of 309,600 new homes. So under their 300,000 per year pledge. Although I'd imagine that number will accelerate during the next couple of years in parliament. 

If they survive. 

At the current rate it would take 6 years to achieve. 

34 minutes ago, kent_white said:

Net addition of 309,600 new homes. So under their 300,000 per year pledge. Although I'd imagine that number will accelerate during the next couple of years in parliament. 

If they survive. 

At the current rate it would take 6 years to achieve. 

that's not bad to be fair, I didn't realise they were doing so well on this

 

Having said that, they're chucking new houses up around here at a right rate of knots, they recently built about 100 at the edge of our village in the space of about 4 months, which was very impressive........although, mildly amusing was when some of them recently flooded, as they've been built near the river, on patch of land that always floods when there is several consecutive days of bad rain

51 minutes ago, kent_white said:

Net addition of 309,600 new homes. So under their 300,000 per year pledge. Although I'd imagine that number will accelerate during the next couple of years in parliament. 

If they survive. 

At the current rate it would take 6 years to achieve. 

Last year  saw towest number of new home completions since 2014 at 130,000.

In contracting, 4,000 construction firms went bump last year, 17% of all insolvencies.

Lack of confidence in Clients who are delaying new starts to factories etc. and contrary to the spin, education and defencce spending being choked by funding being witheld.

The government changed their stance from investing and growth creation to "we'll do it when we can afford it"... that's austerity in my book

 

1 hour ago, kent_white said:

Net addition of 309,600 new homes. So under their 300,000 per year pledge. Although I'd imagine that number will accelerate during the next couple of years in parliament. 

If they survive. 

At the current rate it would take 6 years to achieve. 

I wouldn’t hold your breath. They’re facing the same problems as the tories, NIMBY’s, and I can’t see how their plans are going to get pushed through with all the objections they’re getting.

 

31 minutes ago, Sweep said:

that's not bad to be fair, I didn't realise they were doing so well on this

 

Having said that, they're chucking new houses up around here at a right rate of knots, they recently built about 100 at the edge of our village in the space of about 4 months, which was very impressive........although, mildly amusing was when some of them recently flooded, as they've been built near the river, on patch of land that always floods when there is several consecutive days of bad rain

Encountered a few of them over the years when I was at the council. The site of Fall Birch hospital was a good example. Previously any excess water from the reservoir would shed across the fields and the grounds of the hospital. The housing developer put in a concrete channel turning all of Fall Birch Rd inton a river and flooding all the houses along it.

17 minutes ago, royal white said:

I wouldn’t hold your breath. They’re facing the same problems as the tories, NIMBY’s, and I can’t see how their plans are going to get pushed through with all the objections they’re getting.

 

That Reeves woman sounds thicker than a whale omelette when she appears at the end

They're approaching from the wrong direction by concentrating on major developers and their political body, the HBF

To build social and affoordable houses on thiis scale you need to involve Local Authorities and proper Main Contractors who are used to project delivery, not shareholder driven development companies who just stick a few "poor homes" at the back of their fancy developments to appease the planners.

There's a massive objection round here to a big development on local farm land (its not green belt) - people get angry their kids can't afford houses due to Londoners moving in, but object to any new houses despite the fact where I live they were only built in the early 60s - but they pretend its some sort of middle ages village (they put up one of those village signs but underneath it says Circa 1066 😁) because one house was built there for a cousin of William the Conquerer - and even that is now the club house for the golf club so no one other than members can go in.

 

5 hours ago, Zulu said:

But, but they promised.

Have you seen the actual numbers? ☺️

18 minutes ago, Spider said:

Have you seen the actual numbers? ☺️

The 309,000 quoted earlier wasn't an annual figure, it was from July 24 to Jan 26.

Registrations are slightly up but completions are continuing downwards.

Building Control data from GOV UK:

They've just built "luxury houses" on the avenues in Little Lever.. Or as they call it "Dove Bank".. think it's 400k for a four bed in an area where just eat refuse to deliver due to Anti social behaviour. .. not to mention they'll have teeny gardens etc. 

5 minutes ago, Dimron said:

The 309,000 quoted earlier wasn't an annual figure, it was from July 24 to Jan 26.

Registrations are slightly up but completions are continuing downwards.

Building Control data from GOV UK:

https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/housing-supply-indicators-of-new-supply-england-july-to-september-2025/housing-supply-indicators-of-new-supply-england-july-to-september-2025#further-indicators-of-supply

2 minutes ago, only1swanny said:

They've just built "luxury houses" on the avenues in Little Lever.. Or as they call it "Dove Bank".. think it's 400k for a four bed in an area where just eat refuse to deliver due to Anti social behaviour. .. not to mention they'll have teeny gardens etc. 

And garages too small for today's cars

Just now, Dimron said:

And garages too small for today's cars

And at least 3 bathrooms.

8 minutes ago, Dimron said:

The 309,000 quoted earlier wasn't an annual figure, it was from July 24 to Jan 26.

Registrations are slightly up but completions are continuing downwards.

Building Control data from GOV UK:

We’re busier than ever.

Lot of fake noos about

49 minutes ago, Spider said:

Have you seen the actual numbers? ☺️

Yes. 

Just watching our Temu Trump at the Reform announcement. 

Explaining how the Labour and Conservative governments have utterly failed. 

Whilst announcing his shadow cabinet which has got half of the last Tory government's front bench on it. 

Fucking hell! 😂