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Take it from someone homeless, cutting stamp duty will improve lives

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10.10.2025

MANCHESTER, ENGLAND – OCTOBER 08: Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch waves as she prepares to deliver her speech on the final day of the Conservative Party conference at Manchester Central Convention Complex on October 08, 2025 in Manchester, England.Kemi Badenoch goes into her first conference as party leader with current polling putting the Conservative Party in fourth place behind Reform, Labour and the Liberal Democrats. (Photo by Christopher Furlong/Getty Images)

The Conservatives will make homeownership easier, but we must make it easier to build too, says Laurence Fredricks

I am a senior researcher at Onward, leading our work on housing policy, and a Policy Fellow at Conservative YIMBY. But as a consequence of London’s housing affordability and availability problem, I am also homeless.

Months of searching has produced nothing. Offers hundreds of pounds over the asking price have been rejected. I’ve been ghosted by estate agents and crammed into viewings with 12 others at a time, all competing for a single, overpriced flat. It’s exhausting, repetitive and ultimately indicative of a system that does not work. The outcome is that I am now sofa surfing. And I am not alone in this; there are an estimated 12,500 ‘hidden homeless’ people like........

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