RECOGNISING EXCELLENCE

PROPERTY PROFESSIONALS IN WAITING FROM TU DUBLIN RECEIVED AWARDS ON MARCH 15, AND TWO EXPERIENCED PRACTITIONERS SPOKE ABOUT COMPELLING AREAS OF THE INDUSTRY.

On March 15, TU Dublin honoured some of its hardworking students at an awards evening, and the audience heard from two top-class speakers from either side of the Atlantic. You can see the full list of award winners in Table 1

Housing is built on land

Following the awards ceremony, the first speaker was Toby Lloyd. Toby has worked as Senior Policy Officer for the Greater London Authority,

Associate Director for Navigant Consulting, Head of Policy/Head of Housing Development for housing charity Shelter UK, and Special Adviser to Prime Minister Teresa May for housing and local government. Working on both the advocacy and political sides of the housing issue has given Toby a deep understanding of the factors that influence housing policy. The housing market is built on the land market, both literally and figuratively, and Toby told the audience that land does not behave like other types of possession. There is only so much of it and nobody (bar land reclamation) is making any more of it. If you leave the land market alone, land will accumulate in the hands of very few people, who will extract as much money as possible out of it without having to do much.

Colm Quinn Senior Journalist, Think Media

Policy needs to address this, said Toby: “Not just because it is unfair, but because it fundamentally undermines the efficient workings of the economy”.

Taking the UK as an example, Toby explained that house prices are