The Tories know that in order to win the next general election there has to be a new offer to the under 45s who, despite the stonking majority won by Boris, were still overwhelmingly likely to vote for left-of-centre parties. Many in Number 10 feel that the housing crisis is the single biggest barrier to breaking through to the next generation, and without doing something serious about it demographic change alone will dislodge them from power. Which is why some SpAds were delighted to hear last night that the housing crisis is Dominic Cummings’ first priority post-Covid…

In Cummings’ first SpAd briefing since DurhamGate, the SpAds’ head honcho listed a number of policy areas the Government is set to focus on beyond the pandemic. Notably first and most passionately alighted on was reform of Britain’s restrictive planning system, which was described as making it far too difficult to build. One SpAd told Guido that although Cummings did not go into much detail with regard to what the planned reforms will be, he spoke about planning reform with a real zeal. Owning your own home is a fundamental aspiration in a well functioning property-owning democracy. It is also good politics, without any capital few will support a party that defends capitalism. If they get this right, a second term will become a lot more likely…