Is Gordon Brown having a laugh?

We ask because we learn today that the government is preparing to impose drastic curbs on second home ownership that would stop people buying in sought-after rural areas – the very same government which includes scores of sleazy MPs who are ripping-off the taxpayer, by over £20,000 per annum each, to buy and maintain second homes in London – for no other reason than to cash in on the London property boom! And as London, by no stretch of the imagination, can’t be considered a “sought-after rural area”, then their proposed legislation won’t effect their scamming in the slightest!

We further learn that an inquiry has been commissioned by none other than Gordon Brown. Gordon, of course, has a home in Scotland, a home in London (which the taxpayer at some stage, if not currently, has been helping to fund) and a “grace & favour” apartment at No 10 or is it No 11, Downing Street – so he knows what he is taking about, like a great many other MPs in fact, when it comes to second or third home ownership!

Gordon’s inquiry will reportedly recommend that local authorities should get the power to prevent outsiders buying property they do not intend to make their main residence. This means that those seeking to buy country boltholes that deprive local residents of houses would be forced to apply to the council for a change of use from fully occupied to a second home – a request that could be refused by the council. In addition “outsiders” could be prevented from buying new property – but not MPs or migrants we suspect!

However, Matthew Taylor, MP for Truro and St Austell in Cornwall, claims the shortage of affordable housing in most rural areas was mainly due to an influx of former city-dwellers moving to the countryside permanently. So, if Gordon’s inquiry has the effect of preventing wannabee white-flighters from leaving our increasingly crime-ridden and culturally diverse cities – what effect will the ensuing combination of built-up frustration and sheer desperation have on good community relations we wonder?

Either way the sheer hypocrisy of the current bunch of freeloading “Honourable Members” proposing to curb the property ownership aspirations of the public, no matter how much such measures may or may not be needed, should be apparent to all!