What do property developers expect in return?
Here's the link to the Property Week article - for which you need to register, but there's no pay wall“Last week, the political Establishment figures watched as I was undemocratically excluded from appearing on what was supposed to be an election hustings broadcast on LBC radio,” Christian Wolmar said.
“Now, it is reported that three of my Labour Party rivals for selection have been having their campaigns generously funded by property developers.
“My party colleagues forgot to mention this at our election debates.”
Property Week reports today that, “Big-name property developers and investors have emerged as some of the biggest donors to London mayoral candidates in the early stages of the campaign.”
It had already been established that Dame Tessa Jowell received £10,000 towards her campaign from the chairman of Chime Communications, the company founded by Mrs Thatcher’s former spin doctor, Tory peer Tim Bell. Dame Tessa has since taken an executive job with a Chime subsidiary.
Now Property Week reports that Canary Wharf Ltd has given £11,500 to the Jowell campaign, which has received another £5,000 from the former chairman of Land Securities.
Sadiq Khan’s campaign has received nearly £40,000 in donations from three major property developers.
And David Lammy’s campaign has racked up donations amounting to almost £40,000 from various companies and individuals with multi-million-pound interests in property development in the capital.
Christian Wolmar said: “How can these Labour Party candidates for London Mayor say they will drive hard bargain with developers while taking money from them?
High-profile developers back London mayoral candidates
At one level - and maybe the most important - I'm completely with Christian Wolmar here; it stinks. Tessa Jowell taking money from Canary Wharf Ltd, with its less than helpful attitude towards cycling I find particularly nauseous.
Where I part company with him, however, is in the developer-demonising language.
I think the underlying economics here are obvious - it is about paying for planning permission.
At which point, I delete several paragraphs, leading up to a discussion of Land Value Tax (LVT) - one part of Christian Wolmar's programme - but getting further and further from the main point, and cut to my view, which is that we need developers, and the money they can raise, and that planning permission will be paid for in one way or another, so let's not having it done by donations to Mayoral campaigns, but by a transparent process whereby those who invest in land, and work up ideas for how a London Plan can be realised, pay for the privilege, while also getting a long term return on their investment.
Cue a return to the boring details of how a LVT might work, business rate reform, Community Infrastructure Levy, and all the other ways in which the financial benefits of planning permission can be captured for the public, but hopefully in a more constructive spirit than engendered by learning about donations to the leading Labour Mayoral candidates, thanks to a Property Week journalist working through data published by the Electoral Commission.