At last, a reason to celebrate: house prices are falling | Larry Elliott

It won't be easy to wean Britain off the obsession with ever increasing property values, but it's important to try

The housing market is dead. Britain's biggest mortgage lender, the Halifax, says that prices fell in April by 3.1%, the biggest monthly drop in almost eight years. Newspapers bury this disastrous news way back in their editions for fear that it will spread gloom and despondency.

We need to wean ourselves off this way of thinking. Falling house prices are not disastrous, and only in a country with such a perverted relationship with bricks and mortar could they be seen as such. In Germany, they scratch their heads in bemusement when they hear Britons boast of how the value of their house has soared.

We should make the tax system less biased and start a mass public-sector housebuilding programme

Related: Don't tell generation rent the fall in house prices is bad news | Larry Elliott