How to get a council house -C4

[heyhulahoop]

Anyone watching? It's so depressing. So many zero hours contracts and racist rants.

[DownstairsMixUp]

Watched it last week but thought it was awful tv. Just another program to get people hating anyone on benefits.

[Beaniebeemer]

This series seems really brutal. The housing officers are really horrible. No compassion whatsoever!

[ArrestedDevelopment]

I don't like the fact they use social services as a silent threat if the person is deemed to have made themselves intentionally homeless.
Its almost as if they using that as an ace card to stop the customer trying to get somewhere off the council.
Zero hour contracts should be banned. It would be interesting to see how many people were evicted because of rent arrears and the percentage on zero hours.

[Dulra]

I watched last night and think none of the Housing Officers featured should be working in front line services they dealt with the public appallingly. I know for some there was very little they could do for them but that doesn't mean you have to deal with people who are very vulnerable and very stressed so bluntly. They probably get sick of hearing the sob stories and frustrated with how people get themselves into these situations but they just made the situations worse. The dealt with them with utter contempt and treated them as sub-human it was tough to watch. I think Hounslow Council need to implement a lot of in-house training with their staff and remind them that are dealing with people not numbers

[MrsSpecter]

Agreeing with everything here. Those housing officers are brutal! No compassion at all. And yes, i get it, they are under pressure, cant cry with every client, have heard every story under the sun, get all sorts of abuse thrown at them but come on! They are completely devoid of anything that resembles a shred of humanity. That poor girl being told she was going to birmingham or nothing! That was handled terribly.

Awful show. Just another "stir up some benefit hatred" attempt. And it will work of course.

[MrsSpecter]

The attitudes of those housing officers reminded me of that programme where benefit claimants went "back in time" to experience how they would live when the welfare system first started.

[BrianCoxReborn]

Interesting fact about 91% of people given a council tenancy being born in the UK.

Goes against all the hate bollocks spouted by the right wing arseholes .

[CakeAndChocolate]

Agree with everything here, the only officer I thought showed an ounce of compassion was the one at the end telling the woman she was intentionally homeless and would make a referral to SS. I felt so sorry for her, how can it be intentional when her rent was £900pm and she only earned £300 the month before? Crazy, I really don't know how people on zero hours contracts manage to get by.

[TeaBelle]

Social services isn't a threat. If a family can't house their own children then social services have to assess and potentially house them. It's normally in b&b or private rents, ss just fund and help them to move. It does sometimes feel like a piir use of safeguarding resource though

[wolfwhistleme]

I watched this. One particular housing officer insisting the poor girl move to Birmingham was a proper bitch !

[Oldraver]

Yes I thought the first housing person was a little harsh...then the one trying to send the girl to Birmingham was really nasty.

[CakeAndChocolate]

agree re the Birmingham one, she could have shown a bit of sympathy for the poor girl

[CakeAndChocolate]

Tea so would ss house parent and child together? On the programme last night it seemed to suggest that the child would be taken into care and the mum would be left to fend for herself. Much better if they are housed together.

[expatinscotland]

The fact is they just don't have the stock.

[penisbeakerlaminateflooringetc]

It seemed to me that the whole show was about scare mongering by showing how difficult it is to get a council property. They seemed to be of the point of you that the majority make themselves intentionally homeless by not paying rent.

The officer dealing with the girl who was offered a property in Birmingham was horrible! No compassion what so ever.

But I did want to slap the people saying immigrants get properties by default.

[penisbeakerlaminateflooringetc]

The councils/government have not acted very proactively by selling properties off and not building enough new ones and it is vulnerable people who suffer from this.

[expatinscotland]

'The councils/government have not acted very proactively by selling properties off and not building enough new ones and it is vulnerable people who suffer from this.'

They were prohibited from investing funds made from the sale of properties into building more.

[MrsSpecter]

Its a really dire situation and i very much agree the message of the show was "there are no houses, dont ask for one"

[Abbinob]

Some housing officers are nasty people (most aren't of course@) I had a horrible one, who sent me really far away on purpose (I know it was on purpose because when I fit moved into temp accommodation in the area I live, after a letter to the map the staff at the temp place said they have had loads of empty spaces for ages and the council didn't even ask them if they had any space. Ditto the b and b they use in my area)
I had to live in a shared house in my own with a 8 month old along with 2 men just out of prison. I got a phone call from the landlady warning me they were going to move someone in who wasn't allowed to be unsupervised around children and so not to leave ds around him.
Luckily I left before he came but fucking hell it was terrifying, I was only 22 and over 100 miles away from anyone I knew and had no money or anything. She also said I had 2 hours to get there or the landlady wouldn't let me in (a lie, because LL phoned me and said obviously the time the council have her isn't realistic as I'm so far away so just get there when I can)
They do purposely make things difficult

[TeaBelle]

Cake _ Ss only have a duty to the child but 99 times out of a hundred will house the family as a whole. The 1 case is normally where parents have repeatedly failed to source and keep adequate housing despite extensive support. Renting a room/house is cheaper than foster care

[TeaBelle]

And generally much less upsetting for the children

[castortroy19]

So I guess what is the solution here?

[dirtspeed]

It was really sad to watch, I was lucky that I had a great social worker 10 years ago when I had to apply for housing in London and found the process of getting a flat pretty smooth but it's got desperately awful since then. These days I know about Shelter, the local law centre etc but back when I was 19 I wouldn't have had a clue about how to advocate for myself.

Cake when I was homeless having SS involved was actually crucial for my case as their involvement triggered my priority to a higher level. People view them as a threat but for me they were there to help me jump through the hoops of the system.

[TeaBelle]

The solution:
Ban authorities placing out of area
Allow housing benefit to go direct to landlord
All authorities to have a deposit scheme that a % of local landlords must accept

[sockrage]

There was a single Dad near here who left his mortgaged home as it was repossessed following bankruptcy. He didn't realise he had to wait for the bailiffs to come so he moved out when he got the court notice.

He was initially put in temp accommodation and the council paid for the kids who were very small to be taken to nursery and school.

They then decided because he had left before bailiffs that he was intentionally homeless.

The council repeatedly told him the children would be removed and housed by ss as they had no duty to him.

Only when the media got involved did they help him.

I worry. We are constantly one payday away from being knackered and this terrifies me.