What should be addressed in a Housing bill ?
Ok as a life time housing activist i do support some aspects
of the Governments housing bill such as tighter regulation of Landlords with a
data base of ALL landlords being circulated by local Councils and Government
that will not only see fines for bad landlords , rising from £5,000 to £30,000,
but also could lead to rogue landlords being struck off and banned from
being Landlords.
The scale of the fines should drive up standards and with
tougher rules and fines that make it worthwhile for local councils to enforce
and can only be a good thing,
i have long lobbied both The present Government, and
the Labour party through my advisory role on the Residential landlords
Association which with me on board (before i resigned due to my political
commitments..) has done a huge amount to drive up standards bring in fair
regulation and stamp out rogue landlords.. on these issues, and i
am surprised that as with most Government policy ideas, enforcement and long
term practice steps i have raised have been ignored, such as my Idea and www.peoplebeforeprofit.org.uk policy
that housing benefit payments should be linked to Landlords on a national data
base, this would see public funds through housing benefit only going to
Licensed and regulated landlords who not only insure property is well
maintained and tenants treated fairly, but also we can insure Landlords pay
tax, far to many advertise without using an agent and then keep the cash away
from the tax office, even though most rogue Landlords make a living exploiting
the ever increasing number of people due to low pay and ever rising rent costs
who depend on the hard working tax payer who ends up paying for this
misery through Housing Benefit a staggering £29 Billion of which was paid in
2015 and is certain to rise by an average 3% in 2016 even with The bedroom tax
and the cap designed to reduce this huge part of the welfare bill.
As a Council tenant for almost 40 years, i have some
positive aspect on the” Right To Buy” Entire Council estates have been
transformed with Leaseholders who care about the estates in many cases poorly
maintained by far to many labour Councils and who are at the backbone of local
residents Associations, estate play and youth groups and who spend large sums
of own money on window boxes , cleaning and paying large sums in Leaseholder
charges to Councils who use this to improve and maintain Council homes and
estates for all, These new estates have become real communities with huge range
of different types of people leading to real diversity , community cohesion and
so different from many of the sink estates around the world that end up places
of misery, abuse, neglect and fear.
People Before Profit oppose the Right to Buy as many on the
left do, and with 1.5 Million Council homes sold of, it is a position we should
all support, Thatcher failed to replace each Council home sold with another and
the cash from the sale of this 1.5 Million homes was and has been frozen
under Tory and Labour Governments and my calls and Questions as to What became
of this money, and Why more Council homes have not been built constantly go
ignored.
What we should have done , and should do, with all
future sales of any Social housing which have only been made possible via the
tax me and you pay to the state is to build in a clause that states all COUNCIL
and SOCIAL housing can only be let out via the Local Council or Housing
association to people on Low incomes and that the selling of such
property can only go to people on low incomes and NOT let or SOLD for private
profit, this has to major advantages, it stops Social housing from being bought
by “ Buy To Let “ Landlords and insures as property can only be sold and
let to low paid workers, that the rents and cost to buy will always be low
insuring everyone has equal opportunity to fair rent and if they chose to buy ,
alongside this must be rent control .
Since 2007 Rents increased by just 1% in Germany , 60%
in the USA , but a Staggering 346% in the UK, how can this be right or
sustainable? rent controls such as have just one in to force in Berlin in 2015
in Germany should be in the UK, Why and how has it been allowed that
Landlords have seen property values rise by eye watering 500% and more over the
same period and with interests rates frozen and Landlords’ given tax breaks ,
how has it been allowed that Landlords for example of a 1 bedroom flat in
Surrey Quays in 2007 who got £500 per month on a flat that cost
£25.000 are today with the same flat worth £300.000m securing a rental of
£1200? .
Another aspect to the UK housing crises has been a total
failure to do more to support Self builds, Co-operative housing and to free up
large3/4 bedroom homes when families have grown and moved away to
help older residents move into smaller but still home like homes, The same
concern is with housing for the Disabled and again my party position is clear,
that instead of forcing Developers to build a set number of “ affordable “ (
and i use this word loosely due to the total abuse of its meaning ) , Builders
are forced to build by the square foot, this would insure Councils could
expect developers to create the type of homes they need within their area, such
as quality housing for a Pensioner in a large 3 or 4 bedroom house that could
improve quality of life for the pensioner whilst freeing up a larger home for a
new family starting out, address the disability requirements of a family whilst
not having to spend large sums of public money transforming a house to cope, or
spending lavish sums of tax payers cash via housing benefit
in the private sector whilst a further aspect should be on all housing
that the roofs are used for sola panels to fight climate change and address
fuel poverty for all , if private home owners can get a state subsidy via the
tax payer for panels on the roofs and income from the feed in tariff, why not
the poor and the low paid?.
My other aspect to a Housing bill , would be to scrap the
criminalisation of the homeless, are we nuts? How can it be just that we jail
or evict people who occupy empty buildings, claim NO housing benefit and spend
money in the local community of the building they occupy? . It must be that by
law all empty buildings must be given over to the homeless and housing
charities and Colleges and Universities to offer secure low cost short term
housing, instead of the obscenity of paying with tax payers cash money to
security firms to keep buildings that could house People empty.
Evictions have a devastating impact on people life not just
from a practical perspective, but also from a mental health perspective and i
found it staggering in a freedom of Information request to Lewisham Labour
Council for breakdown on rent arrears and number of people hit by the Bedroom
tax, some £12 Million pounds was owned in rent arrears whilst over 3000
People had Bedroom tax bills they could not afford to pay and had to pay as no
smaller flats available to move into , the biggest cause of evictions
is errors in housing benefit, if a Housing officer had the power to sort
our and had a hot line to deal direct with Housing rent issues, these
evictions and rent debt that in 90% of cases has to be written of as evicted
tenants are to poor to pay, We could end evictions and the misery it causes ,
whilst other impacts are that in many areas and even in the USA evictions lead
to down value of homes that are in the same area as an empty abandoned and
boarded up building leading to other home owners facing negative equity and
debt themselves it clearly is an issue that can so easily be addressed by
thought and logic , i hope my take on the Housing crises is one you share and i
am proud that my political party that does have a long history in standing up
and defending social housing has such clear policy agenda on it, just check out
www.peoplebeforeprofit.org.uk
you can also follow me on twitter@Raywoolford or tune into my monthly “ Talk
Radio Europe “ show 12-2 UK time the first Friday in each month. I have 2
books Published. “ Deptford “ “ Food Bank Britain” and my latest book “
Everything you need to know about Austerity but was to brainwashed to ask
“
Ray Barron-Woolford
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