Speaking at an event organised by GradRoutes, an initiative from The Guernsey Institute to understand barriers young people face in returning to the island following higher education, Housing president Steve Williams and Economic Development president Sasha Kazantseva-Miller discussed the issue of housing affordability and availability, and admitted that hopes were slim for young islanders as the market stood.
‘Demand exceeds supply, and we don’t have enough supply of accommodation,’ said Deputy Williams.
Deputy Kazantseva-Miller said that planners needed to look upwards to address the housing shortage.
‘We’ve generally got very low density housing in Guernsey,’ she said.
‘We actually had a visit from Andium Homes – the largest affordable housing provider in Jersey – just recently and they said when we travelled from the airport: “It’s very visible how low-rise your built environment is”.
‘The issue is that our construction sector doesn’t know how to build high-rise.’
She accepted that many islanders did not want to see more high-rise housing either.
‘We’re in this perpetual issue. Everyone wants housing being built, and everyone wants high-density housing, but just as long as it’s not next to my house,’ she said.
‘It’s this irreconcilable situation where we absolutely want houses, but I will only sell my piece of land for the highest possible amount, and I don’t want anything that interferes with my views. So it’s a very difficult situation.
‘I think the expectations need to change. We’ve got to be honest with ourselves, we’ve got to solve those problems. That does mean homes have to be built in places where some people may not want them to be built.’
Deputy Williams had little succour to offer local university students about their housing prospects beyond the family home should they seek to return to the island.
‘A collection of the challenges are securing the land with the right planning permission at the right price,’ he said.
New sites being identified for so-called ‘affordable’ development, for partial purchase or rent below standard market level, was good news, but unlikely to be of immediate direct benefit to young islanders entering their first job.
‘Land is very short in Guernsey, so inevitably anyone who’s got a piece of land has got their own aspirations and expectations about what it’s worth,’ said Deputy Williams.
‘Our housing market changed particularly during Covid when there was a population shift. People returned to Guernsey of all sorts of ages and the market was not able to react. The construction industry was going through a bit of a quiet period and it’s taken a long time to turn it around.
‘It isn’t a quick fix trying to build new homes.’