Councils spent £3.5bn on temporary housing in last five years

You could build 35,000 £100k houses for that money which would house 140,000 people

The problem is a 100k house including land costs is a pipe dream. The majority of people live in economic or population centres where there is a limit of land pushing up prices. As mentioned above if you build a housing estate just for council housing you risk going back to the old days of areas people avoid going through due to crime and reputation.

There need to be more council homes built but they need to be evenly distributed in all areas to avoid this. Part of the problem is mentaly when it comes to paying for big projects. The mindset is very much on balancing the book for the financial year, as that is how councils and managers are judged. A private company would calculate business plans and realise that spending 25bn over 4 years will be cost effective compared to renting properties within 10 years. Unfortunately no one thinks long-term and is more concerned of their legacy and targets before they move to a different role. PFI was a good example of this and we will be paying the cost for years to come.
 
Can someone explain to me why, instead of spending the money on temporary housing, the government isn't just building more houses.

I just don't get it.

Residents holding up the planning process because they dont want 500 new houses on their door step.

Greenies holding up the planning process because a newt might have to move home.

Local planners holding up the planning process because the think they are gods.
 
The council bought one of the houses across the road from me and turned it into two scatter flats. Just a couple of streets away theres loads of council flats where loads of them are always empty.
 
Well played Maggie and all those that followed, selling off council houses and not doing anything near enough to provide replacement council homes for an ever growing population, now ~10+ million bigger than when Maggie started this snowball.

Well played indeed.

Council housing was in decline long before Maggie came on the scene.

There was a very interesting mini-series on the BBC (I think) some years ago about the rise and fall of council housing.

Initially the role of Council housing was to provide quality homes for working people. The rents were commercially viable (IE Not subsidised) and people were expected to pay them and to look after their properties (Tennants who neglected the properties or failed to pay their rent would be evicted)

At the peak something like 40% (IIRC) of the nations housing was council owned and everybody, including the middle classes aspires to get one because they were the most modern and best equipped housing available.

Children were encouraged to "Inherit" their parents council houses with the aim of creating long term generational communities.

The rot set in when the criteria was switched to "Social Need" rather than providing homes for working families.

within a generation many council estates were transformed from smart desirable places to live to sink estates riddled with crime and other social problems.

If anything, "Right to Buy" probably limited the spread of this malaise by ensuring that some working families actually remained.
 
I don't know where you're getting your information from but it's completely false. EU migrants have no right to "jump to the front of the queue". EU migrants must pass a habitual residence test before receiving benefits and aren't subject to any special treatment in terms of social housing. In fact, the whole point of freedom of movement is that they're treated no differently to UK citizens.

They may not supposed to be treated differently but from what I hear (from someone who works in a housing association) is because their circumstances are different they do get put ahead of locals in practice.

Ie: a local person usually has connections with other people in the area, so the council/housing association will not as readily class you as homeless or in need, because you have friends and family to lean on, whereas a migrant has no one, so will be housed first.

So its not 'policy' that they go to the front of the queue, it's just how the system works at ground level
 
Can someone explain to me why, instead of spending the money on temporary housing, the government isn't just building more houses.

I just don't get it.

Seems the same crazy situation where we pay millions in exorbitant fees for temporary NHS agency staff, but can't afford to recruit permenant ones
 
Its quite simple.

The majority of the big firms that house these folk and individual owners are wait for it.... drum roll.... Conservative voters.
 
Saw an interesting story whete houses were needed and the developers were pushing the council to build on greenbelt land.

couple of miles away thete was a lpad of brownbelt that needed development and had space for houses.

But ultimately i guees the developers would make more profit by developing greenbelt.

So there is a stand off...
 
I can see the government dropping the manifesto pledge to extend right to buy to buy to housing association tenants. I see this as a good thing, even though I would benefit from it to the tune of £100,000 as I bought my flat under a shared ownership scheme.

Leasehold I assume?
 
Why don't we let councils levy a tax on empty homes to make up the social housing bill. It might lower rents to get rid of the tax or flood the market and lower actual housing costs.

I wonder how it is going to be in 30-40 years when generation rent tries to retire?

Some councils already impose increased council tax on empty dwellings
 
I can see the government dropping the manifesto pledge to extend right to buy to buy to housing association tenants. I see this as a good thing, even though I would benefit from it to the tune of £100,000 as I bought my flat under a shared ownership scheme.

Part buy part rent. if so your ineligible, I've checked.
 
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