For many of us, buying a home is one of the most important purchases we will ever make.

We tie up our livelihoods, our dreams and our hopes in them. This makes housing a critical issue – acutely so for our children, “generation rent”, who increasingly find themselves priced out of the market.

For too many years we have been failing to build the new homes we need to meet demand. This has led to rising prices, undermining our competitiveness and our reputation as a destination for investment.

Much of the current debate, on whether we are in a housing bubble and the role of Help to Buy, has missed the point that the critical issue is the supply of new homes.

From businesses to charities, and from Whitstable to Westminster, there is a clear consensus that we need to be building more homes to satisfy demand. Yet we are still not building anywhere near the 240,000 new homes a year the Department for Communities and Local Government has identified are required.

In the South East, where we need to be building around 41,700 homes annually to meet demand from new households, we only built 19,860 homes in 2012/13.

The status quo cannot continue – bold action from across the political spectrum is required to shift the dial.

It was great to see the Government kick-starting a programme to sell off central government’s high value public land in the Queen’s Speech, but as one of the biggest owners of public sector land, we need local authorities to do more in this area.

Ensuring they have properly identified specific sites for housing as part of their five-year supply of land is a starting point.

It would also help if we improved cooperation between councils and Local Enterprise Partnerships by pooling the New Homes Bonus, the grant paid by government to councils to increase homes.

Ultimately, we want to make the housing market more affordable. A vibrant housing market delivers enormous social and economic benefits, driving growth and jobs, and regenerating local areas.

We must remember that housing bubbles are usually a result of supply not matching demand. If we don’t take decisive steps to boost supply now, future generations will continue to face an uphill struggle in realising their dream of home ownership.