Yvette Cooper urges housebuilders to take long-term view

Housing and planning minister Yvette Cooper has expressed her "concern" that housebuilders are worrying too much about short-term market pressures, and not enough about long-term housing goals.

Cooper delivered the warning to an audience of top figures in the housebuilding industry who were gathered at the Housing Market Intelligence Conference on Tuesday.

"I have to say I am concerned by the tendency for many in the industry to respond far more strongly to short-term market pressures, whether be around uncertainty about interest rates or mergers in the industry, than to the long-term demand for housing. This is a challenge for us. I am concerned about the fact that we saw starts fall earlier this year," she said.

The note of warning came in the face of ambitious government targets which set out plans to build three million new homes by 2020, and to make all new homes zero-carbon by 2016.

The minister also indicated that the government was getting ready to make an announcement between now and Christmas about building more housing for Britain's ageing society, following on from work headed up by Baroness Andrews at the CLG.

Also speaking at the conference was former Crest Nicholson boss John Callcutt, who was expected expected to set out in detail the findings of the delayed Callcutt Review of Housebuilding Delivery. The report is now not expected to be published until the middle of November.