Reuben
15th February 2010, 22:38
From The Third Estate: http://thethirdestate.net/2010/02/curb-on-shared-housing-government-allows-councils-to-push-out-the-young-and-less-well-off/
Housing minister John Healy has announced that councils will soon be able to limit the number of shared houses in their localities. Landlords who wish to rent out homes to 3 or more unrelated people face having to seek planning permission. Allegedly such measures are being put in place to curb anti-social behaviour. I would imagine that Tory councillors accross the country are already salivating over the opportunity to gentrify their localities by simple bureaucratic fiat.
Alot f media reports have equated shared housing with students. Yet as many of you will recognize, shared housing is pretty much the norm for many people in their twenties and beyond. For one thing, living with peers or friends can be great fun. Perhaps more importantly, a great many people are simply not in a position to spend 12,000k a year on single-handedly renting a home in places like London. This move will limit the supply of housing to the young, and the less well off. At the very least this is likely to land these groups with higher rent bills, as they bid against each other for a dwindling stock of shared housing. Equally it will limit choice. It will be those of us who now need to save up bigger amounts than ever before to get on the housing ladder whose incomes will be hit.
These new local authority powers, of course, come at a time when the Tories are dominating local government. It is incredibly naive to imagine that such councils will not simply take the opportunity to discourage new immigrants and those on lower incomes from settling in their areas. Yet I also predict that these measures will damage areas in ways that people do not initially imagine. Bars, pubs, cafes, and other places of entertainment are great to have around. Limiting shared housing an area is highly likely to damage their viability – after all shared housing appeals not only to the young and childless, but also, almost by definition, to the sociable.
Finally, aside from the economic impact of this move, it also strikes me as deeply intrusive. As I said before, the rules will apply to shared housing being rented to unrelated people. When the Tories proposed marriage tax breaks, virtually everybody from Nick Clegg leftwards attacked it. For the same reason we should angrily oppose a measure that effectively makes something as basic as access to housing dependent on one’s marital or familial arrangements.
Housing minister John Healy has announced that councils will soon be able to limit the number of shared houses in their localities. Landlords who wish to rent out homes to 3 or more unrelated people face having to seek planning permission. Allegedly such measures are being put in place to curb anti-social behaviour. I would imagine that Tory councillors accross the country are already salivating over the opportunity to gentrify their localities by simple bureaucratic fiat.
Alot f media reports have equated shared housing with students. Yet as many of you will recognize, shared housing is pretty much the norm for many people in their twenties and beyond. For one thing, living with peers or friends can be great fun. Perhaps more importantly, a great many people are simply not in a position to spend 12,000k a year on single-handedly renting a home in places like London. This move will limit the supply of housing to the young, and the less well off. At the very least this is likely to land these groups with higher rent bills, as they bid against each other for a dwindling stock of shared housing. Equally it will limit choice. It will be those of us who now need to save up bigger amounts than ever before to get on the housing ladder whose incomes will be hit.
These new local authority powers, of course, come at a time when the Tories are dominating local government. It is incredibly naive to imagine that such councils will not simply take the opportunity to discourage new immigrants and those on lower incomes from settling in their areas. Yet I also predict that these measures will damage areas in ways that people do not initially imagine. Bars, pubs, cafes, and other places of entertainment are great to have around. Limiting shared housing an area is highly likely to damage their viability – after all shared housing appeals not only to the young and childless, but also, almost by definition, to the sociable.
Finally, aside from the economic impact of this move, it also strikes me as deeply intrusive. As I said before, the rules will apply to shared housing being rented to unrelated people. When the Tories proposed marriage tax breaks, virtually everybody from Nick Clegg leftwards attacked it. For the same reason we should angrily oppose a measure that effectively makes something as basic as access to housing dependent on one’s marital or familial arrangements.