534 days ago
An early childhood memory from Butterwell Farm ,was of hearing a series of loud explosions as one of the bottles of ginger beer my parents were making, exploding and setting off a chain reaction among the other bottles. In those days we only had glass bottles. I have never tried my hand at this before but, with the elderflower champagne and cordial season and nettle beer season now almost upon me, I thought I’d also give it a go. I am now working on my ginger bug plant as you can see below.
4379 days ago
The Daily Mail has its knickers in a twist about how young hard working couples cannot afford to get on the housing ladder without help from middle aged hard working parents ( er…Daily Mail readers). The Council for Mortgage Lenders says action is needed. And the Conservative Party panders to this anger saying the situation “is not right”. There is a hint ( to appease Daily Mail readers) from some shit for brains housing minister, Grant Prisk, that the Government will take steps to address the “problem”. They are all wrong – they promote a ponzi scheme because it is popular to do so.
That young folks cannot “get on the housing ladder” is undeniable. That is because a) the banks will not lend unless you have a hefty deposit and b) prices ( in terms of price to income ratios) are by historic standards and in absolute terms too high.
Given that prices are too high it is exceptionally prudent of the banks to require steep deposits and having done their conkers on more or less everything they touched it is in no one’s interest (least of all the taxpayer who actually owns most of the banks) to force or bully them into making reckless loans in this area too.
So the only way to address this problem is for house prices to fall.
