So we are in a logjam over how to deliver housing (again). The government’s target is 300,000 new homes, yet it cannot fathom how to direct the industry – and the planning system - to deliver it.

Last week Michael Gove pulled the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill’s reading in the House of Commons over fears of a backbench revolt over keeping housing targets. This shows ministers flip-flopping over this most important of policy decisions again.

I can’t recall a time in my career when we haven’t been in a housing crisis, in that the system is failing to deliver homes in locations and at prices that people can afford. Part of this is down to the way the planning system is rigged to ration consents and plays out through a perpetually unpopular numbers game.