More Social Cleansing from Dave

stator

CLAPTON wrote: »

Blaming a dead lady is a fine substitute for actual thoughtful policies

I don't see what her death has to do with it.
I was clearly blaming her, John Major, Tony Blair, Gordon Brown and David Cameron, plus the rest of their 'governments'.

CLAPTON

stator wrote: »

I don't see what her death has to do with it.
I was clearly blaming her, John Major, Tony Blair, Gordon Brown and David Cameron, plus the rest of their 'governments'.

The failure to build houses and the high immigration rates are not exactly Thatcherite issues

stator

CLAPTON wrote: »

The failure to build houses and the high immigration rates are not exactly Thatcherite issues

They absolutely are. She's the one who stopped councils from building houses.

cells

stator wrote: »

They absolutely are. She's the one who stopped councils from building houses.

its never as simple as one variable. House building relative to population and population growth had to fall from the 1970s onwards as population growth was weak and house building was far more than population growth and that could not have continued

Between 1971 to 1981

The population grow by less than 0.5 million yet over 3 million homes were built.

It does not matter if thatcher was in power or comrade corybn its clear the UK was building lots of homes and seeing modest population growth. To build another over 3 million homes in the 1980s would have been stupid overproduction

Between 1981 to 1991

the population grew by 1.1 million units so in the 1980s the build rate fell to 'only' 2.1 million units. still more homes were built than people added to the population


By 1991 you could make a good argument that the UK had a small surplus of homes (London definitely did) as over 5 million homes had been built over the previous two decades for a population growth of just over 1.5 million

So it made perfect sense for the build rate to fall. You dont want to build homes to sit empty.

If thatcher did stop councils building homes it was a good thing, because their subsidised output would have crashed the private builders ouput. in fact on your graph it shows private output going up in the 80s almost exactly as much as the social output declined

Rich2808

CLAPTON wrote: »

The failure to build houses and the high immigration rates are not exactly Thatcherite issues

It's of course a total red herring. When Thatcher was PM an ordinary person on an ordinary wage could afford to buy a house in London - same under Major.

And then we had Bliar/Brown/Cameron/Osborne who decided inflating house prices was a substitute for having a sustainable economic policy. Now someone on triple average wages would struggle to buy a one bed in Tottenham.

As for getting rid of social housing we need more of it. How many earners can afford market rents at £1500 a month a pop - and when these sink estates have been gentrified what locals will be able to afford these properties which have just increased 400 per cent.

We need the sort of social housing ww used to have - for the workers not the shirkers. I remember that call the midwife episode where to get a council house Chummy the nurse and her policeman hubby had to prove they were responsible hard working citizens to get considered. Now it's the opposite.

cells

Rich2808 wrote: »

It's of course a total red herring. When Thatcher was PM an ordinary person on an ordinary wage could afford to buy a house in London - same under Major.

Then why was ownership lower in the 1980s and early 1990s than say in 2010 if it was so easy for people to buy? Prices were cheaper but that is not the only factor.

Rich2808 wrote: »

And then we had Bliar/Brown/Cameron/Osborne who decided inflating house prices was a substitute for having a sustainable economic policy. Now someone on triple average wages would struggle to buy a one bed in Tottenham.

For London I think it was more to do with population growth rather than house building policy. Also I think the problem only really started around about 2005. It usually takes politicians (and even the public) some time to realise and react. The financial crysis in 2008 and change of government in 2010 kind of filled those 5 years. I feel the conservatives did see there was a problem and put a pro building MP in charge of housing however the NIMBYs chopped his head off. Now things are getting more serious cameron is looking to boost building by effectively knocking down a couple of hundred thousand council homes and building twice as many in their place. also with tax they are trying to slow the inflation of prices that might help temper increases in london somewhat

of course outside of London is a different story. about half the country is still between very cheap (eg stoke-on-trent you can pick up a house for £45k). and cheap and affordable.

As for getting rid of social housing we need more of it. How many earners can afford market rents at £1500 a month a pop - and when these sink estates have been gentrified what locals will be able to afford these properties which have just increased 400 per cent.

the problem is people look at national averages and think its true or applicable everywhere when you really need to look at local stats

London has too many social homes. but dig deeper and you will find some councils have maybe a small shortgage of social homes (eg councils with <10% of the stock as social) while some councils definitly have way too much (eg hackney islington tower hamlets with close to 40% of the stock as social do you think it should be 100%?

also the allocation in London is wrong. most the social homes are in Z1 to Z3 and much fewer in Z4-Z6 where it should be the opposite

We need the sort of social housing ww used to have - for the workers not the shirkers. I remember that call the midwife episode where to get a council house Chummy the nurse and her policeman hubby had to prove they were responsible hard working citizens to get considered. Now it's the opposite.

so in the past where did the shirkers live?

setmefree2

cells wrote: »

Then why was ownership lower in the 1980s and early 1990s than say in 2010 if it was so easy for people to buy? Prices were cheaper but that is not the only factor.

Indeed.

Prices were cheaper because few people could get a mortgage. Building societies had quotas and you had to get in the queue and wait for money to become available.

Oh and interest rates averaged 10% reaching 15ish % in the early 90s....

setmefree2

cells wrote: »

For London I think it was more to do with population growth rather than house building policy.

Pre 9/11 no wanted to live here because the IRA were always bombing us.

antrobus

stator wrote: »

They absolutely are. She's the one who stopped councils from building houses....

Thatcher built more council houses than Blair did.:)

cells

setmefree2 wrote: »

Pre 9/11 no wanted to live here because the IRA were always bombing us.

it was not just one thing

London was special in that it saw a huge population crash, while the councils built a huge amount of subsidized housing so much so that by the mid 1990s the population of London was living less dense than any other region of England. Just imagine that, people in the capital city had more housing space than people up north

As a result prices in London in the mid 1990s were far too cheap. You could buy the average terrace in Waltham forest for just £70,000 which is below or close to build cost


London went from too cheap in 1995 to about fair value in 2005 and now in 2015/6 prices are kinda expensive but not extremely so