At the end of last week, the Government suggested there should be resonant names – that evoked the grandeur of past heroes – for seven magnificent New Towns to be built across England. Just as Clement Attlee had envisioned a new Jerusalem after years of Tory neglect, so Labour would once again build the wholly new settlements of the future.

If Leeds South Bank is a New Town then Stonehenge is a cutting edge aesthetic installation reflecting the vibrancy of Young British Artists

If Leeds South Bank is a New Town then Stonehenge is a cutting edge aesthetic installation reflecting the vibrancy of Young British Artists

The ambition of post-war years, which gave us Milton Keynes, Harlow, Bracknell, Crawley and other visionary developments, was to be re-kindled. The names suggested for these New Towns – Attleeton, Elizabethtown, Seacole, Athelstan, Pankhurst – provoked debate. They were meant to.

Because the entire exercise was a masterful piece of misdirection. The Government aren’t marking a break with the poverty of Tory ambition on housing by building seven New Towns. The main thing they’re building on are plans they inherited from the last Government. From me, in fact.

On Monday we discovered that the seven New Towns are, for the most part, decidedly old hat. There are three urban regeneration schemes, in the heart of London,........

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