Good Old Fergus!

Loughton_Monkey

MFW_ASAP wrote: »

I'd happily have some of my tax money go towards social housing, but I'd insist on only those that require social housing to actually receive them.

We should not have the situation where people who qualified for social housing 10 years ago because of financial problems, still living there when those problems are long gone and they can afford to rent from the private sector, or indeed buy their own house. We should not have the situation where people who qualified for a family home 10 years ago are still living there when the kids have left and they have empty rooms.

Agreed. Given that virtually all "Social Housing" is heavily subsidised, it is rather perverse to distinguish between whether a person is subsidised by £300 HB a week towards a private landlord's rent of £300, or whether he is subsidised by paying £300 of his own money on a Council House rent that is "worth" £600 in a commercial market.

We do not subsidise the cost of food, clothes, vehicles, televisions, subscriptions, etc. for the poor, but we do provide a modicum of money to buy them at market prices. This principle should operate for housing. As odious as Fergus may be, he is a businessman, just like Mr Tesco and Mr Sainsbury, and their expectation to be paid in full for their market-priced goods should be honoured.

If a childminding business, for instance, had 3 'customers' out of 15 who continually didn't pay their fees, I cannot see Channel 4 news describing the owner as "heartless" by refusing to enrol the child for next term.

brit1234

Heads up

Judith Wilson on channel 4 news tonight v her renters

mayonnaise

brit1234 wrote: »

Heads up

Judith Wilson on channel 4 news tonight v her renters

Thanks for the head up, brit.
Wise words again from the Wilsons.

Mrs. Wilson : 'People need to get off their backsides and work'

Mr. Wilson : 'People have to take responsibility for their lives. Employment is the passport to get in a house. Gone are the days when you could rely on housing benefits.'


I'm sure all of us MSE'ers can agree with that. :beer:

http://www.channel4.com/news/landlady-people-need-to-get-off-their-backsides-and-work

Graham_Devon

The more they speak, the more it becomes clear that it appears they simply don't like a certain section of society, and prefer another section. As they sugest themselves, they don't really have any reason to evict 50% of the housing benefits claimants, but they can, so will.

Indeed, Judith Wilson suggested "so long as they keep their heads down and we don't notice them, we won't do anything about them". This speaks volumes about their intentions - those being, they are targetting the people on benefits regardless and the arrears thing appears to be a simple smokescreen given as a reason to deflect from all this.

In this case, they don't like poorer people on benefits, and prefer, specifically, eastern europeans.

I don't think everything they are doing and saying can be classed as the market "functioning at it should". Not now they have said so much since the start of this thread.

Overall though, they do have some points. It's just the way they go about putting them across makes them look like such distasteful, spiteful, nasty individuals, that any decent points fade into deafening insignificence.

dktreesea

Now I've seen the clip on Channel 4 I've got a bit more sympathy for old man Fergus. If a private tenant not on benefits lost his or her job and couldn't afford the rent, even with the LHA chipping in, presumably they would move out to a cheaper place. So now the government, rightly so as maybe, decides it can't afford the level of housing costs it has been incurring, do we really expect landlords to lower their rents down to the new level of the LHA/HB?

Loughton_Monkey

Graham_Devon wrote: »

In this case, they don't like poorer people on benefits, and prefer, specifically, eastern europeans.

Not 100% sure. I think they definitely just prefer people who work. But they do tend to suffix this by 'like East Europeans'.

Graham_Devon wrote: »

I don't think everything they are doing and saying can be classed as the market "functioning at it should". Not now they have said so much since the start of this thread.

Overall though, they do have some points. It's just the way they go about putting them across makes them look like such distasteful, spiteful, nasty individuals, that any decent points fade into deafening insignificence.

Au contraire Mr Devon. The exact reverse. One classic example of a market "not functioning as is should" is where a single businessman is expected to suffer >51% arrears on a large segment of his business [rather than the 1% (?) he would get from working tenants]. This heavily distorts the market in a way not seen by any other (that I can think of).

Imagine that it (again) became de-rigeur for Boy Bands to trash their Hotel Rooms. The smart hotel right next door to the big venues [the one that gets most of the business] would soon say "No Boy bands", and quite rightly. All the others nearby would do likewise even if they hadn't experienced the problem. Even if some Boy Bands didn't do that. How otherwise could they legitimately compete in the quality hotel trade? Would Channel 4 criticise the owner for being 'heartless' and lobby him to change his mind?

So Fergus is simply restoring the 'free market' and making it more 'functional'. So I fully defend his right to do so. Boy Bands and Benefit Claimants are clearly, absolutely, and utterly "bad risks"

Can the House Insurance market compete if it were forced to give landslip cover for all those seafront houses, and what would it do to the functionality of the market?

I will repeat, however, that I agree 100% that this is a nasty, odious couple and they are also doing it gleefully in order to make a point. [But it is a point worth making because the whole subject of HB, and the new UC rules that make it more difficult/lengthy to get direct payment, is a complete and utter mess that needs sorting out].

Like most people, I'm not against Housing Benefit in principle. It's just that (a) under Gordon Brown, it went far, far, too high and wide to the point of being ridiculous, and (b) when it is 'paid' it should be done by the direct supply of the accommodation rather than by bunging a big brown envelope and allowing them to throw that money anywhere but at the landlord. It's like learning of a drought in Zimbabwe, and watching Comic Relief throw an envelope with $2 million in $100 bills at Robert Mugabe and saying "here you go.... feed your people." That's naivety in the extreme.

editor1

There are some seriously misinformed and "nasty" people posting on this thread about the idiot Landlord scum who prospers off all our backs one way or another - call it what you want chaps, but these are facts.

Living in Asia most of the year, Hong Kong, and having lived in Singapore, both allegedly the "most free economies globally" according to the US rightwing Heritage Foundation - do posters of hate find it strange that in both of these Asian Tiger economies, both with higher living standards than the UK, and HK at least with a NHS and basic welfare state, that both countries have large public housing provision. In HK one in three families are housed by the state via the HK Housing Authority and rents capped at prices the poor can afford to pay.

It would seem in the UK, you have greedy !!!!!!s and rightwing neoliberal idiots who fail to do any comparative research or analysis.

Have a guess what, staying in the UK for two months per annum, I can only say it is the UK that now resembles a Third World country, this despite its huge wealth held in few too hands. Still, greed at the end of the day is greed, and housing bubbles are housing bubbles.

We need rent controls and the banning of these !!!!!!s who own huge estates of properties and benefit of the normal persons toil.

Please all do some research, specifically look at the two country's I've mentioned and then answer why they can house the poor and low paid, when we cannot?

dktreesea

editor1 wrote: »

There are some seriously misinformed and "nasty" people posting on this thread about the idiot Landlord scum who prospers off all our backs one way or another - call it what you want chaps, but these are facts.

Living in Asia most of the year, Hong Kong, and having lived in Singapore, both allegedly the "most free economies globally" according to the US rightwing Heritage Foundation - do posters of hate find it strange that in both of these Asian Tiger economies, both with higher living standards than the UK, and HK at least with a NHS and basic welfare state, that both countries have large public housing provision. In HK one in three families are housed by the state via the HK Housing Authority and rents capped at prices the poor can afford to pay.

It would seem in the UK, you have greedy !!!!!!s and rightwing neoliberal idiots who fail to do any comparative research or analysis.

Have a guess what, staying in the UK for two months per annum, I can only say it is the UK that now resembles a Third World country, this despite its huge wealth held in few too hands. Still, greed at the end of the day is greed, and housing bubbles are housing bubbles.

We need rent controls and the banning of these !!!!!!s who own huge estates of properties and benefit of the normal persons toil.

Please all do some research, specifically look at the two country's I've mentioned and then answer why they can house the poor and low paid, when we cannot?

Are you seriously that naive? I've lived in both those countries. Singapore has some shocking slums, even now.
http://sg.news.yahoo.com/blogs/singaporescene/hidden-slums-singapore-revealed-021739643.html

As for Hong Kong, in spite of China's efforts to improve living conditions, take a look at the rooftops next time you fly into HognKong.
http://www.breitbart.com/Breitbart-TV/2014/01/03/Inside-Hong-Kongs-Rooftop-Slums
Public housing in Hong Kong? Hah! With a seriously long waiting list. As in maybe you never get it.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2282764/Hong-Kongs-human-battery-hens-Claustrophobic-images-slum-families-squeeze-lives-tiniest-apartments.html

As to rent control, sure, provided you don't want private sector landlords to provide any of the housing for rent.

dktreesea

Perhaps these two don't come across that well because they are not very good at expressing themselves. Too blunt and unrefined.

Maybe on the one hand it annoys them that some of the people living on their estates don't work and go to some lengths to preserve their "my time's my own" way of life. I suspect though, that they have realised that by enabling these people to live like that, through the provision of accommodation, they are part of the problem, not the solution.

Really, why should any of these people work when landlords like the Wilsons are prepared to rent to them what looks like fairly nice houses? If the Wilsons no longer want to be part of the "enablers" , then they need to stop providing accommodation to that particular group of people. Something, from the looks of it, they have now decided to do.

MFW_ASAP

dktreesea wrote: »

Perhaps these two don't come across that well because they are not very good at expressing themselves. Too blunt and unrefined.

Maybe they just like being controversial? I can see them sitting with their pals sat around the TV having a good laugh over their performance. They must have reached the stage that whatever they say, it's viewed in a negative way or not listened to, so they simply play the game and have a chuckle while they do it.

Alternatively they are just small minded and nasty people who haven't been changed or improved by their wealth.