We are getting our just deserts

The General Election was only three weeks ago, and already we are seeing the impact of that result. In the Queens Speech, the quaint anachronistic ceremony where an aging unelected rich person dictates from a speech produced by the governing party. I take one policy as an example where popular rhetoric will have the opposite impact.

Britain is in the midst of horrific housing crisis. In a town like Leeds there are in excess of 23,000 people on the waiting list for social housing. These people are typically being subsidised by the taxpayer to stay in sub-standard accommodation provided by private landlords. Our young people and not so young people cannot afford to purchase houses in the South East of the company. I believe that you need a salary of £70k to be able to buy a house (flat with one bedroom) in London.

What is the government’s answer to this, to enable tenants of social housing  to buy these properties. These belong to private housing associations, largely charities, who have either bought or built these properties using commercially raised money or money donated. Essentially they are privately owned properties. Now imagine the outcry if the government was to compulsory purchase any property owned by a landlord to give the tenants the right to buy. Let us take the example of tenant farmers on the estates of the aristocracy. The Magna Carta would be invoked, human rights would be violated. The parallel is the dissolution of the monasteries by Henry VIII.

So could we stand for this unfairness if this policy had a good outcome?  Typically these properties have to be sold at a huge discount, and even then many of the tenants cannot afford them. If we take the parallel of state council house sales in the 1980s and 1990s typically a significant number ended up in the hands of private buy to let landlords to be rented out again but this time not at social rents.

The sugar on the pill is supposed to be that for every house sold to a tenant another one will be build to replace it. A great idea, but of course as the houses are sold at a discount this will require a subsidy from the taxpayer. Again if experience is a good predictor of the future, in Doncaster they sold in excess of 200 council houses between 2010 and 2015, how many did they build, just nine.

So here is an example of a policy that was conceived for political reasons and will actually make the problem worse, very much worse. I will leave you with the questions as to whether we will ever know the truth, still this is the result of democracy, and we get what we deserve!!!