Anti social housing reform

With the Government's policy reform agenda in full swing, says Ruth Patrick, attention is turning to yet another area where the effect on disabled people will be disproportionate

Currently, social housing tenants are granted a “secure tenancy”, giving them considerable rights and the confidence that, providing they keep to the terms of their tenancy, their house is theirs to keep. Implicitly criticising this status quo, David Cameron said: “At the moment we have a system very much where, if you get a council house or an affordable house, it is yours forever and in some cases people actually hand them down to their children.”

He went on to suggest that a better approach might be to regularly review tenancies, to see if the tenant’s situation had changed such that they could afford private renting, or move to a smaller home. The suggestion is very clear – if your situation has altered perhaps you should be encouraged, or even compelled, to move to a smaller house, or out of the social housing sector altogether.

Cameron has promised a consultation paper to explore possibilities for making tenancies in social housing more flexible – a euphemism for less secure. It is critical that the case is made against such a move.

Most importantly, it is socially unjust to further reduce the rights of social housing tenants, which includes some of the poorest and most vulnerable in society today.

Disabled people are twice as likely as non-disabled people to live in social housing, and so any changes would affect this group disproportionately.
Stacks of research show that the best social housing estates are those with low turnover of residents, where a sense of place and community becomes established. Changing the social housing offer so that tenancies are provided for shorter periods would only increase the disharmony and problems on some social housing estates. Further, changes could create an “aspiration trap” as people would be fearful about accepting a job if that might put their home at risk.

Cameron is quite right that there are real problems with the size of the council housing waiting list (at 1.8 million and growing) but to suggest that addressing this requires a reduction in the rights of the poorest is both mischievous and wrong. What is really needed is a concerted effort to increase housing supply and measures to provide affordable, decent housing for all, as the charity, Shelter argues.

On a different theme, the Government repeatedly voices its commitment to getting people off welfare and into work. Well, I’ve got an idea for them. Why not kickstart the economy, and get the country working, by commissioning the biggest programme of social housing construction since World War II?

• Shelter is inviting people to join their campaign for affordable housing: shelter.org.uk