Could building social rented homes save the government money?
The government spends more than £30 billion a year on supporting people’s housing costs through the benefits system, around 15% of its benefits budget. Couldn’t some of this money be saved if part of the budget were spent instead on building social rented homes?
Over two million foreign nationals excluded from social housing and benefits
After the June 30 deadline for EU nationals to apply for settled status in the UK, another tranche of the population is now prevented from renting accommodation, getting homelessness help or receiving benefits. EU citizens who have not applied to the EU settlement scheme (EUSS), together with those who have arrived since the deadline, are […]
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 […]
Government policy needs to return to building homes to let at modest rents
As the latest UK Housing Review is published, co-author John Perry describes how government priorities have shifted from direct investment in affordable housing to personal subsidy through housing benefit. If asked about how the government spends money on housing, most people would probably say they build council houses – but of course they’d be wrong. […]
Experts encourage more social housing investment as a way to lower welfare bill
The case for more investment in affordable housing is growing. Two reports launched this week looked at the arguments for a massive programme of affordable house building and both concluded that more investment would significantly reduce the welfare bill. Wednesday’s report from social housing campaign group Shout and the National Federation of Almos warns that […]
Why the government’s ‘long-term economic plan’ should include building more social rented homes
There’s a strong economic argument for building more low-rent homes to address the massive shortage of housing according to a new report by Capital Economics for SHOUT (Social Housing Under Threat) and the National Federation of ALMOs. In fact there are two good arguments – that the capital investment boosts the economy and helps pay […]
Five ways low wage-earners are being banished from central London
London is getting less and less like the rest of the country. Elsewhere houses prices have struggled to reach 2007 levels, but in the capital they’ve already grown by more than a fifth. The price of a one-bedroom home in London would secure a three- or even four-bedroom house almost anywhere else. Because of its […]
The overwhelming case for new public housing
John Healey MP and John Perry We face a housing and cost of housing crisis greater than at any point since the aftermath of the second world war. Britain is not building enough new homes, and the accommodation that is available is increasingly unaffordable to millions of people. It is a measure of a nation’s […]
Cameron’s Migration ‘Squeeze’
Under pressure from Jeremy Paxman on Newsnight in February 2003, Tony Blair conceded that the number of asylum seekers coming to Britain was too high and pledged to halve them by the following September. The promise was widely derided, but Blair had done his homework: officials had assessed the impact of Labour’s 2002 Asylum Act, […]
Six reasons why the UK immigration bill needs to be amended
When even the immigration minister struggles to enforce the rules, what chance do private landlords have? Mark Harper’s difficulty in getting to grips with his own immigration rules should give all parties pause for thought. Is it really sensible to extend the checks imposed on employers so that even trickier ones have to be carried […]
John Perry lives in Masaya, Nicaragua where he works on