During the Deputy Leadership campaign the issue of housing came to the fore, thanks to questions from party members, and the readiness of Jon Cruddas to take the issue up. John McDonnell also quite correctly made a big pitch about housing in his leadership campaign.
It seems that at last the higher echelons of the Parliamentary Labour Party have recognised that the crisis of the lack of council and social housing is very damaging to Labour supporters and our prospects for the future.
The government has now produced a Green Paper for consultation, which is rather vague on actual proposals, but does acknowledge that unless there is a big increase in the building of houses for controlled rent, the lives of many people, particularly in inner cities, will be permanently blighted.
The consultation ends in mid- October, and it is essential that representations are made to the Department of Communities to set out the key issues.
Firstly, the government must accept the terms of the Fourth Option. At the moment, local authority tenants have the choice of stock transfer to a housing association, the establishment of an Arms Length Management Organisation (ALMOs), or full privatisation of their estates. If they opt to remain as council tenants they are then punished via an inability to invest and improve the estates through government inspired loans or grants.
Despite this, thousands of people voted to remain as council tenants because they believe this will give them greater accountability over their landlord. It is high time this issue is resolved and council tenants are given a genuine choice.
Secondly, the only way that the housing crisis can be resolved is by building a large number of council houses. The last Labour government even towards the end, was building 100,000 new council homes a year. This fell to zero under the Tories and the early years of New Labour. Government philosophy since 1997 has essentially been to tack social housing as an add-on to private sector development, and say that social housing is only affordable if accompanied by high priced private developments. This has to be challenged. We should be building council housing because we need it as a national priority.
Thirdly, many tenants of housing associations, or leaseholders through part-rent part-purchase arrangements feel unrepresented by those associations who are increasingly behaving like private sector property developers rather than responsible social organisations. It is time that real democracy was brought to housing associations and real accountability for their expenditure, and they were legally prevented from selling vacant properties to fund new developments.
Fourthly, many people, especially in major cities, are now leading precarious lives in the private rented sector. This is largely unregulated and very expensive. The 1974 Labour government, despite being in a parliamentary minority, introduced comprehensive protection for private sector tenants and rent controls. Whilst this might go against the grain of New Labour thinking, it is necessary to prevent the exploitation of people’s desperate housing needs by private landlords who are given tax incentives to build places for rent.
For a government that is dedicated to getting value for money in the public sector, it is incredibly wasteful to refuse local authorities the opportunity to build new council houses whilst at the same time, through the Housing Benefit system, shoring up the worst aspects of the private landlord system.
I am constantly shocked by the disgraceful conditions that many otherwise homeless families are forced to live in when they are placed in privately rented accommodation by housing authorities. I frequently come across families for whom housing benefit pays rents of £300 per week for appallingly maintained flats. This is a waste of public money, and a benefit trap for those placed in this position.
We have the opportunity to turn things around, produce housing for need and stop our obsession with feeding the voracious private sector market.
During the Deputy Leadership campaign the issue of housing came to the fore, thanks to questions from party members, and the readiness of Jon Cruddas to take the issue up. John McDonnell also quite correctly made a big pitch about housing in his leadership campaign.
It seems that at last the higher echelons of the Parliamentary Labour Party have recognised that the crisis of the lack of council and social housing is very damaging to Labour supporters and our prospects for the future.
The government has now produced a Green Paper for consultation, which is rather vague on actual proposals, but does acknowledge that unless there is a big increase in the building of houses for controlled rent, the lives of many people, particularly in inner cities, will be permanently blighted.
The consultation ends in mid- October, and it is essential that representations are made to the Department of Communities to set out the key issues.
Firstly, the government must accept the terms of the Fourth Option. At the moment, local authority tenants have the choice of stock transfer to a housing association, the establishment of an Arms Length Management Organisation (ALMOs), or full privatisation of their estates. If they opt to remain as council tenants they are then punished via an inability to invest and improve the estates through government inspired loans or grants.
Despite this, thousands of people voted to remain as council tenants because they believe this will give them greater accountability over their landlord. It is high time this issue is resolved and council tenants are given a genuine choice.
Secondly, the only way that the housing crisis can be resolved is by building a large number of council houses. The last Labour government even towards the end, was building 100,000 new council homes a year. This fell to zero under the Tories and the early years of New Labour. Government philosophy since 1997 has essentially been to tack social housing as an add-on to private sector development, and say that social housing is only affordable if accompanied by high priced private developments. This has to be challenged. We should be building council housing because we need it as a national priority.
Thirdly, many tenants of housing associations, or leaseholders through part-rent part-purchase arrangements feel unrepresented by those associations who are increasingly behaving like private sector property developers rather than responsible social organisations. It is time that real democracy was brought to housing associations and real accountability for their expenditure, and they were legally prevented from selling vacant properties to fund new developments.
Fourthly, many people, especially in major cities, are now leading precarious lives in the private rented sector. This is largely unregulated and very expensive. The 1974 Labour government, despite being in a parliamentary minority, introduced comprehensive protection for private sector tenants and rent controls. Whilst this might go against the grain of New Labour thinking, it is necessary to prevent the exploitation of people’s desperate housing needs by private landlords who are given tax incentives to build places for rent.
For a government that is dedicated to getting value for money in the public sector, it is incredibly wasteful to refuse local authorities the opportunity to build new council houses whilst at the same time, through the Housing Benefit system, shoring up the worst aspects of the private landlord system.
I am constantly shocked by the disgraceful conditions that many otherwise homeless families are forced to live in when they are placed in privately rented accommodation by housing authorities. I frequently come across families for whom housing benefit pays rents of £300 per week for appallingly maintained flats. This is a waste of public money, and a benefit trap for those placed in this position.
We have the opportunity to turn things around, produce housing for need and stop our obsession with feeding the voracious private sector market.