Sorry Roger
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Unfortunately the government is doing all they can to drive landlords out of the market.
As for house prices, the answer is simple. Build more. There's a lot of house building going on in the town where I live, in Lancashire as you might imagine, and a newbuild 4-bedroom semi goes for about £250k. An older 4-bedroom detached with a gym/playroom lower floor was on the market at £140k and couldn't sell. Because (for no good reason) there aren't that many people want to live here.
If there are too many people in a given area, they need to build more houses. QED. We can waffle round it all we like, but the reason house prices are rising stupidly like they are, is because ultimately too many people are chasing too few houses.
The biggest barrier to building more houses are the large house building companies, because it is more profitable to obtain sites and planning permission and then slowly release new homes than it is to build at scale and flood the market. There are about a million empty sites with residential planning permission.
A simple solution would be to charge council tax, based on the approved plans, once planning is granted but before the building is completed. This could be on a sliding scale along the lines of Year 1 0%, Year 2 200%, Year 3 300%, Year 4 400%, Year 5 on 500%. That would do a lot to stop land banking.