Right to Buy is shocking value for money – a sensible government would ditch it
Right to Buy continues to fiercely divide opinion. Here, John Perry argues why he believes calling time on the 40-year-old policy is now the sensible thing to do Here’s a good question for a pub quiz: what was Britain’s biggest ever privatisation? Was it British Gas, or perhaps water or electricity? All of these raised […]
The government commits billions to private housing – it’s time to fund social homes instead
How much has government housing investment been cut since 2010? Headlines at the time reported that it fell by 60% and many people’s impressions are that it has since stayed at something like that level. But as the UK Housing Review has shown by looking at the detailed figures over the last four years, the […]
It’s time to look again at revenue support for new build
Everyone agrees we need to build more homes for social rent and last year the rules were changed so that both Homes England and the London Mayor can help finance them via capital grant. The problem is that the sheer scale of output required – as many as 90,000 new homes per year – means […]
The loss of social homes must be stemmed
According to Crisis, to tackle new housing needs and address the backlog of overcrowding, sharing and unsatisfactory living conditions, we need to build 90,000 social rented homes per year in England. Yet currently we struggle to produce 5,000. This means that, far from meeting new needs, we’re not even building enough to replace the social […]
Our homes are wasting energy on a prolific scale
Do you remember when housing associations were falling over each other to prove how ‘green’ they were? But since the recession and David Cameron reportedly telling his aides to “get rid of all the green crap” the funding has been cut and the social sector’s priorities have changed. Yet we all know that the linked […]
Ministers should have listened to Right to Rent criticism six years ago
It’s taken over five years but the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants has now won an argument that was championed from the start by CIH. Back in July 2013 the housing minister wrote to CIH’s chief executive setting out plans to deter ‘illegal’ immigrants by obliging private landlords to check the passport of […]
UK social housing performance over the last 30 years
An article to celebrate 30 years of the magazine Social Housing. Social Housing magazine was a child of its time. Created in 1988 just as housing associations’ access to private finance was formalised, it was there both to report on what was happening and to provide guidance to everyone involved. It was a time of […]
How do we build 100,000 social rented homes each year?
Crisis and the National Housing Federation have just published a new report showing that 100,000 social homes are needed across Great Britain. With all but 10,000 of those needed in England, the biggest challenge will be to the Westminster government and will require a step-change in how it delivers housing. The high numbers reflect the […]
The mess of government intervention in housing
Which housing tenure receives most subsidy? Inside Housing readers know that the question isn’t a simple one and that the obvious answer – social housing – isn’t necessarily correct. The quest for a full analysis has just been boosted by housing finance experts Peter Williams and Steve Wilcox, whose report Dreams and Reality looks not […]
‘Reclassification’ is the spectre in Irish housing
Irish housing associations (‘approved housing bodies’) have had their finances reclassified so that they are part of local government, causing consternation in the sector at the threat of greater state control. This article is a response to this decision from a UK perspective, where housing associations recently faced a similar problem that has since been […]
John Perry lives in Masaya, Nicaragua where he works on