Building Talks podcast teams up with Jackie Sadek and Peter Bill for housing crisis series

The Building Talks podcast is launching a new series called Home Truths, which will be co-hosted by Jackie Sadek and Peter Bill, two experts who have worked in housing and urban regeneration and have co-written a book together on the subject.

In this election year, Peter and Jackie will be taking a deep dive into the housing crisis, an increasingly urgent concern that has risen up the agenda for voters.

Explaining the theme of the podcast, Peter said: “We thought it would be worthwhile exploring this issue, it seems to be terribly important to everybody but there seems to be no answers.”

What we need is a very radical rethink about how we provide housing in this country

Jackie Sadek, Home Truths co-host

Jackie added: “What we need is a very radical rethink about how we provide housing in this country. It’s affecting everything we do, it’s affecting the entire economy.”

Over five weeks, starting from next Tuesday, they will be sharing their views and talking to special guests who know all about the challenges of building the numbers and types of homes that communities need to thrive.

Jackie has spent over 40 years in the property, development and urban development sector. She started her career at the London Docklands Development Corporation, she has worked for private developers and in the public sector for local authorities and government agencies, and became a government adviser for Greg Clark and Michael Heseltine.

She is now chair of the UK Innovation Corridor, a partnership of local authorities, universities and innovation and science companies in the London-Stansted-Cambridge sub region.

Peter trained as a quantity surveyor and worked for 20 years in construction, half of that time for the housebuilder George Wimpey, before moving into journalism and becoming the editor of Housing Today’s sister title Building in 1990 and then later editor of Estates Gazette.

Peter is also a former Building Talks guest having appeared in Building’s 180 anniversary special episode to talk about his time editing the magazine.

Jackie and Peter co-wrote the book Broken Homes, but they do not agree on all issues - quite the opposite. So expect some lively debate, even some good-natured bickering between them.

The first episode of Home Truths will be available to download on Tuesday 7th May.

Home Truths is a Building Talks series in association with Housing Today and Building. Episodes will be released every Tuesday on our websites and will be available via the main podcast providers such as Spotify and Apple.