Ever since the Spending Review was published in November there has been uncertainty about where this leaves the HCA’s Affordable Homes Programme. In finalising the UK Housing Review, out today, we’ve been disentangling what has happened. Here is a summary of our findings although, of course, some figures may change again as a result of…
Immigration checks for new tenancies start today (February 1) but they don’t affect social landlords, do they? Actually, they do – because although many tenancies are exempt, all landlords need to be aware of those that aren’t – and of the repercussions of the checks applying across the private sector. From February any new tenant…
The regular Homelessness Monitors published by Crisis for each of the four countries of the UK have helped marshal the evidence and focus attention on a persistent problem which rational minds would have thought had been solved in the UK well before this century began. Unfortunately, not only is this not the case but in…
Will the chancellor’s bid to halt the decline in owner-occupation work? The Autumn Statement’s extra investment for housing towards the end of this parliament is very good news. We could never hope to address our national supply crisis without government action. But the way it will be configured means a massive boost to homeownership, apparently…
Reclassification of housing associations was an accident waiting to happen, but it’s wrong to let it determine what kind of regulation should apply to the sector. It’s ten years since Steve Wilcox in the UK Housing Review first warned of the possibility that housing associations could be reclassified as public bodies. At that time the…
Up to 90% of Syrian and other asylum seekers who make it to Britain face homelessness. Social landlords can offer advice, support – and homes. When the plight of Syrian refugees made September’s headlines, housing organisations rushed to offer rehousing across Britain. But can they contribute to the government’s resettlement scheme and, if not, how…
In their general election manifesto, the Conservatives promised to ‘extend the Right to Buy to tenants in Housing Associations’. More than 1500 housing associations, all registered charities and some, like Peabody and Guinness, over a century old, would have to let tenants buy their houses at discounts of up to £103,000 each. The cost would…
Up to 20,000 refugees will be resettled in Britain from Syria. How can social landlords engage with this and other schemes to help those on their way or already here? What is the scale of the crisis? Around half of Syria’s 23 million people have been displaced by civil war since 2011. Most are still…
The Home Office is pushing ahead with the roll-out of immigration checks by private landlords, but has still not published its evaluation of the first phase of the scheme. In the meantime, an independent assessment confirms many of the worries that the Chartered Institute of Housing and others had when the idea was first put…