Housing activists are right to be angry – but it’s the government, not MIPIM they should attack

The MIPIM property fair is taking place this week at London’s Olympia centre, and it has proved an irresistible draw for the capital’s burgeoning group of housing activists who are furious at the huge profits developers are in London while ordinary people find it harder and harder to afford a home.

People look at a scale model of the city of London on March 11, 2014 in Cannes, southeastern France, during the MIPIM, an international real estate show for professionals (Getty)

According to campaigners, one in 12 people are languishing on the social housing waiting list. An Ipsos Mori poll this week found that more than a third of Londoners are considering moving away from the capital because of high housing costs – including a third of all private renters.

But the activists’ call to #stopMIPIM is too simplistic; our anger should be directed at the government, whose policies are allowing developers to make huge profits while escaping their responsibility to provide affordable homes.