a third of brits lived in council housing

Jowo_2

ninky wrote: »

... i don't know the figures but afaik council housing rents were not / are not subsidized. the idea is that the rents of the tenants would cover the costs. in the 1970s only 11 percent of tenants were out of work (and therefore on benefit / subsidised). ..
.

whereas these days, two thirds of social housing tenants claim housing benefit, a reflection of higher worklessness, low pay (working poor) and high number of pensioners who occupy it.

ninky_2

Jowo wrote: »

whereas these days, two thirds of social housing tenants claim housing benefit, a reflection of higher worklessness, low pay (working poor) and high number of pensioners who occupy it.

it's more a reflection that the percentage of the population housed in social housing has significantly reduced - and with that the qualifying criteria has massively contracted.

those who could have expected to have the choice of social housing in the 1970s just don't have that choice now.

perhaps if social housing was more readily available we wouldn't have people engineering themselves into situations to qualify (e.g. teen single mums).

IveSeenTheLight

ninky wrote: »

those who could have expected to have the choice of social housing in the 1970s just don't have that choice now.

perhaps if social housing was more readily available we wouldn't have people engineering themselves into situations to qualify (e.g. teen single mums).

Do you envisage the government expanding council housing ro such a level as it allows for 1/3 of the UK population to live in council housing?

Where will they get the funding for such a property expansion?

As I recall, there was always a waiting list for council housing and apoints system based to move higher on the list.
It was this list that ensured that people engineered situations to push them higher on the waiting list.

tanith

IveSeenTheLight wrote: »

Do you envisage the government expanding council housing ro such a level as it allows for 1/3 of the UK population to live in council housing?

Where will they get the funding for such a property expansion?

As I recall, there was always a waiting list for council housing and apoints system based to move higher on the list.
It was this list that ensured that people engineered situations to push them higher on the waiting list.

My Parents were on the council waiting list for 19yrs and that was in the 1950/60's in fact we were a family with 5 kids and my 2 eldest sisters had left home by the time we moved from a 2 bed top floor private flat ( with a shared bathroom and all 5 of us shared a bedroom) to a 3 bed house..

ninky_2

IveSeenTheLight wrote: »

Do you envisage the government expanding council housing ro such a level as it allows for 1/3 of the UK population to live in council housing?

.

err...no. i can't see that on the horizon.

whether it might actually be a good idea is a different question however.

StevieJ

IveSeenTheLight wrote: »

Hence the reason for the sell off.
Would you buy a place that was in need of major maintenance and repair.
The government didn;t want to be left holding the problem of the upkeep of social housing, thus instead tried to pass this to the private sector by selling off their stock.

Sure the discount headline appears to be a mistake, but do people really consider the fundamentals that made them want to get this off their books as soon as possible?

Nothing to do with the Thatcher view that she was building a permanent Tory majority on the the backs of the increased home ownership?

Thrugelmir

StevieJ wrote: »

Nothing to do with the Thatcher view that she was building a permanent Tory majority on the the backs of the increased home ownership?

A lot of post war housing was built with an intended life span of 10 years. (Though some it is still standing today). Much of the rest was poor quality. The quality of housing stock today bears little resemblance to that of 50 years ago.

John_Pierpoint

It all went wrong in the 1960's when there was a push to build 500,000 "new homes" per year,
This meant flats flats and more flats.
These were the disasters - many have been demolished.

For some reason the UK manages to breed people who refuse to behave with any form of civilization, when put in flats .
Migrants excluded, the Continentals do not seem to have the same problems.

http://www.basilspence.org.uk/video/gorbals-demolition?KeepThis=true&TB_iframe=true&height=500&width=640

michaels

Sorry Ninky but it is a subsidy - if the properties could be rented privately for more, regardless of ownership then money is going from the tax payer to the tenant regardless of the costs - think of it another way - what would the site of new social housing be worth to a private developer?

A second point - the reason housing benefit is so high is because there is a shortage of housing and it is rationed by price - housing benefit just means those who do not pay for it are those who are not priced out. This of course then becomes a powerful disincentive for such people to earn their own income as they then face massive marginal effective tax rates.

Wee_Willy_Harris

michaels wrote: »

Sorry Ninky but it is a subsidy - if the properties could be rented privately for more, regardless of ownership then money is going from the tax payer to the tenant regardless of the costs - think of it another way - what would the site of new social housing be worth to a private developer?

A second point - the reason housing benefit is so high is because there is a shortage of housing and it is rationed by price - housing benefit just means those who do not pay for it are those who are not priced out. This of course then becomes a powerful disincentive for such people to earn their own income as they then face massive marginal effective tax rates.

There are areas of the country where private rentals are CHEAPER than social housing. Are you suggesting they are subsidised?