Morning Briefing: further figures show property price stutter

In the news

The now-regular figures on stutters in the property market continue, with The Guardian writing up Rightmove’s latest statistics showing a £10,000 fall in the asking price of new homes coming onto the market.

Some light has been shed on plans to shake up the immigration system post-Brexit, with limits on EU immigration for any workers earning less than £30,000 a year, as Politics Home reports. This, of course, would be something of a catastrophe for the housebuilding world which is heavily reliant on EU labour, especially in London.

There will be an exemption for those “moving for a role in particularly high demand with a lower salary”, and the sector will be keeping its fingers crossed that this means construction trades.

Gordon Brown, the former prime minister and chancellor, criticises Universal Credit again in an interview in The Guardian.

“You can’t solve child poverty with the existing system,” he told the paper. “Universal Credit is completely underfunded and every time they move people onto it you see more poverty. Minimum wage jobs don’t pay enough to keep a family with two or three children out of poverty.”

The Express & Star reports on the progress of a pilot of the Housing First scheme to help rough sleepers being carried out across the West Midlands. In Liverpool, where the scheme is also being piloted, the council says it has taken 51 former rough sleepers off the streets since September.

In Glasgow, the city council has asked Holyrood for more money to house destitute asylum seekers, reports The National. It comes amid mounting concern over the systems in place to house asylum seekers in England.

In the Independent, members of the Elephant and Castle community launch a furious tirade against London mayor Sadiq Khan for his approval of a planned regeneration of the local shopping centre.