Although this target seems large, necessary, and stretches well into the future, it might be improved by substituting an element of organised self-build for much of the social housing concept.

Building costs could be lowered and self-worth of new occupants enchanced if part or in some cases all of the actual building work were to be carried out by the new owner-occupiers.

A new partnership model of the building industry and new homeowners and self-build co-operativescould be created, including vocational learning of building techiques.

Alternatively, prison populations might be lowered by greater use of Community Service to include some building work.

Reservation of most of the new homes for groups currently disadvantaged by income and age could redress much current disaffection.

dr venables preller, Warminster, UK

Most people in the country should be forced to rent all their lives and pay most of their income to landlords. After all, if it was good enough in 1860, why not now? Why should English workers be any better than hardworking Chinese and Indian people? We have to make sure that the best people maintain their position in society now that manufacturing industry has been decimated. The way to do that is to "mine" the population. We've got to get the money from somewhere. English workers must once again learn to know their place.

Sue Moore, Kingston,

think you need to look at the bigger picture, these houses are need nothing to with people buying for investment purposes, it doesn't help true, but the amount of people to houses is low, as for penisons it got nothing to do with them, if any think of there home as a penison than they got no sense at all.

James, Pontefract,

Insightful thinking Michele. Sadly your gain is the future generations loss - but you're not concerned about that are you?

Dave, London,

To Michele from Richmond


And you can live on bread and water and add additional 100 grands and buy a house without a mortgage

jake, Kingston, Surrey

I don't smoke, i don't drink, i don't drive a car and use public transport as i value my time. i'm not married and i hold down a job inlondon paying just less than £30,000 a year.

i am still paying over £550 a month on debts accured at university, 3 years after graduating, (as the government gave me no grants, which they have now reintroduced, even though i come from a working class background with no finacial assitance from home to get me through uni) and i am one of the lucky ones who has a reasonable job with good career prospects.

With Rent , commuting and a mobile taking up another £750 a month (and i live with my parents to keep costs down) how am i expected to save for a deposit with just £150 a month when i wish to develop relationships/ socialise with my friends?

whilst i can understand Michele's reluctance to see the value of property drop, how shouldwe solve this issue when BTL has bought much first time buyer houses? and graduates who should be able to can't buy

Adam, Medway,

Presumably some of these houses will be used to house the convicts that the prisons don't have room for any more.

Jaundiced, Trowbridge,

Finally a worthwhile policy!

The whinging of Baby boomers will doubtless soon be playing over the newsheets and chat rooms of the English media but in all honesty they need to take a look at the financial distress they've put upon the current young generation.

Left to them was a free country for which their parents had given their livelihoods and lives. Yet the children of the most unselfish generation the western world has ever seen has protested and stomped upon building initiatives for years to deny their own offspring and descendants the very chances and opportunities which they recieved by grace only of their circumstances.

Now those same people have the obscene gall to insist that government maintain their artificially high real estate prices because instead of investing in stocks, bonds and debentures they have poured their monies into (and have borrowed against) houses, locking down the market and stepping upon the heads of the young trying to get a hold on the ladder.

John Swaine, Malta, Malta

As well as housing for first time buyers, I hope people with middle incomes will be included.

I also hope that the Eco homes will include office space so that people can work from home and therefore not have to commute to work. How about gardens so people can 'grow their own'?

I live in the South West and besides housing we need to generate money for the area so that this is a prosperous place to live as well as a beautiful one. The only people who can afford to buy here are those with big incomes who buy a second home for the weekend. Last but not least - why can't these eco homes be beautiful as well as sustainable? Please, no more housing of the 70's and 80's. No more brown framed windows, and plastic doors. Why can't we have glass and light and open spaces?

To paraphrase Kevin McCloud of Grand Designs, eventually great design and technology becomes affordable to the rest of us. Why not then affordable, sustainable housing that 's also well designed and aesthetically pleasing?

Shirley Belwood, Wimborne, Dorset

I thought this Brown character was supposed to be bright? I don't see any evidence of it yet. On The Today Programme this morning he denied that immigration was a major pressure on the housing market. Well if we are building 100,000 new homes a year and 600,000 Eastern Europeans enter the country in the same year it doesn't take Einstein to establish where the problem lies. He then referred to the great house building days of the fifties and sixties when 300,000 houses were built per annum to meet the demands at that time (strangely another time in our history when we had mass immigration). In the seventies that slowed, just after the Town & Country Planning Act 1972 was introduced. Finally, he wants all the banks to be able to lend us more to make things more 'affordable'. Well Gordy, all that will do is make houses more expensive as the market for buying them increases with 1000's of people with bigger mortgage capacity chasing the same housing stock!

Mark, Birmingham, UK

Post War Labour built acres of council housing, leaving vast numbers of people to rot on estates that had no services, not even public transport. It was to their lasting credit that the Thatcher Government decided to sell off that stock. What a release it must have been to the new owners if only to have a front door in a colour of their own choosing. Council housing was an awful concept not least of all because people were clumped together without choice. Often estates were used as dumping grounds for the criminal and the dysfunctional. Cheap housing sounds absolutely benign but it spells cheap designs, social stereotyping, the slums of tomorrow. Better no immigration, away with this misguided philanthropy. The idea of affordable housing is a matter for the building industry to satisfy, for the market. Interventions by Government and councils, the pressure to expand, is harming communities and trashing the country so everyone is losing: More family, less immigration, less housing.

Malcolm Turner, Alsager, England

I assume Michele from Richmond is being ironic....?

Mark, Birmingham, UK

That should just about house all the uncontrolled immigrants we can expect by 2020 - nice one Gordon!

Mike Bibby, St Albans, England -not EU

There is no housing supply problem. If there were a genuine supply problem, there would be more households than homes, and families would be forced to live on the street or in tents. This clearly isn't the case.

What we have is a tenure problem. Too many houses are owned by people who don't live in them, so they are being rented out.

If you want to beat the housing problem, look at who houses are owned by, and introduce tough legislation to make buy-to-let less profitable. That would be a much quicker, cheaper, greener, and more lasting solution.

Neil, London,

If the PM is serious about his housing pledge, and is looking for some across-the-pond expertise, he should consult with Messrs. Michael Dubb and Leslie Lerner of Beechwood Homes of Jericho, Long Island, New York. They have built many homes across Long Island and in the City of New York, which have literally "opened the doors" to affordable housing for countless New Yorkers.

Edward B (Woody) Ryder IV, Greenlawn, USA/NY

What is the point of building 3 million new "affordable" homes if a large proportion of them are going to be snapped up by Buy-To-Let purchasers?

I live near Bournemouth and a large house was recently demolished and 8 flats built in it's place. These were suitable for first-time buyers but all now have "To Let" boards outside having obviously been bought by people who have no intention of ever living in them themselves.

The government needs to recognise this as a contributing factor to the housing problem and to take some remedial action such as limiting the number of properties each landlord can own.

DEBBIE BRISTOW, CHRISTCHURCH, DORSET

Can someone tell me why, if we are so short of homes in Britain, we are allowing immigrants into the country in their thousands?
Tell me why greedy property developers are allowed to buy up homes and lease them out.
Tell me why people are allowed second, third, or even more homes in seaside resorts and beauty spots, driving local people out and standing empty for most of the year?

Rather than carpet our countryside in new development, allocate existing homes to British people who need somewhere to live. Increase taxation on second 'holiday' homes.
Britain is overcrowded - limit immigration, or else most of Gordon Brown's new homes will be owned by immigrants.
Worse still, they will be bought up by property developers and rented for extortionate amounts.

Anthony Mark, Birmingham,

So, those with money will be able to buy even more houses as an 'investment'. If houses were used for living in there wouldn't be anything like the shortage there is now.

PR, Cornwall,

By building more houses Mr Brown will cause the price of our BTL investments to stagnate (of course a drop is impossible). Our pensions will lose out again!
There should be a clampdown on the number of new buildings to keep the value of our houses, Mr Brown should protect the interest of existing homeowners and law-abiding BTL investors who have benefited from 100% equity returns (adjusted for debt leverage) over the past year. If future expectations lower, there will be a crash in the prices.
It is a shame. Firts time buyers should quit smoking and save for their deposit instead of crying. A study has demonstrated that if you stop smoking you can pay £20000 more against your first house purchase. Then you can also stop drinking and add additional 20 grands. Think about that!

Michele, Richmond,