Is it all the Tories fault that there's so many homeless people?

[Rosepetalgeranium]

There's so many more homeless thesedays. Is it down to austerity?

Yes it is massively down to the long running Tory government.
Tories' love privatisation and cuts to government services. So if someone is already vulnerable, it's likely they will be even more likely to end up in a bad situation and then neglected. Less mental health support, poorer quality education, less chance of earning enough money to live on... all these things lead to homelessness and or crime for some people. And those things have knock on effects for all the rest of us.

Yes, it is, but it's far easier to blame individuals. UC is a fucking disgrace.

Walk through birmingham you will find dozens of rough sleepers as a child there were not many at all

Lack of social housing? Maybe an issue my housing association (former council) builds more housing sells some rents some and as property's become avaliable from people leaving they sell them part buy part rent however if they have a family in need they remove the house from sale and allocate it to them 🤷‍♀️ we actually have a lot of housing stock in our area and still more being built

Nope it's Labour's fault for their uncontrolled immigration which led to a vast population increase.

@DoctorTwo Thank You and i hope you are well too

@Justanotherlurker It is down to people having little or no disposable income.

Thats why ASOS and Boohoo are having trouble and they are online only.

housing associations selling off places as holiday homes.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/telly_addicts/3304710-Dispatches-Getting-Rich-from-the-Housing-Crisis

Nope it's Labour's fault for their uncontrolled immigration which led to a vast population increase.

Lmao...
Oh wait you're serious?

It is down to people having little or no disposable income

Oh, I didn't realise the death of the high street was a recent thing, maybe you should offer your wisdom to market analysts

Thats why ASOS and Boohoo are having trouble and they are online only

That is related to your first point, but also that people are genuinely waking up to the consumerist nature and forever rising profits

To try and pin it on austerity and Tories shows a complete lack understanding and just an opportunity to bang the political drum, which is why nothing will change even if Corbyn gets in, and why the EU have given France a special case so that Macron can push through his labour reforms.

Oh wait you're serious?

They probably are, but it is a factor, and for all the hard-line remainers we could follow EU presidents and deport all inactive migrants. This is where people's missunderstanding and mental gymnastics take hold though.

As I said earlier, it's easier to point the finger at the opposite political party and take a moral high ground rather than see geopolitical situations

I think the cuts to mental health services and support for addicts has certainly caused an increase in homelessness. In our local area (in London) there was usually 3 or 4 who you would see regularly. Now there are so many more-there are often tents set up in random places and a lot more homeless just trying to find somewhere to go. There has been a very visible increase in drug addicts/dealing too.

Justanotherlurker all you are doing is defending the indefensible.

The Tories are cutting inheritance thresholds and corporation tax in 2 tranches around 7 billion, they do not need to do either.

Meanwhile the charitable sector (from hospice care to homelessness) has seen its central gov funding cut or frozen, meaning they have to rely on further public generosity and the public don't have the disposable income due to wages in real terms falling.

So, what happens? the charities and services folk relied upon become stretched and fail = more people in crisis.

Should Blair have built far more social housing? of course but the present crisis is under a Tory gov and they are responsible to put it right.

Possibly. But the root causes started years ago. Thatcher offered the council tenants (like us) a right to buy. This was great in theory, offering the chance of home ownership at reduced prices.
However, instead of the councils reinvesting that money into building more council housing, they squandered it or hid it.
So, year on year, no new council houses were built. Stock was depleted as people bought and sold their council homes.
Now there's insufficient stock at a time where folk cannot afford to buy, so want to rent.
Plus many luckier folk have buy to let mortgages which again, shrinks available stock for buying or reduced rent.
Lots of locals have been pushed out of their area by Londoners buying 2nd or 3rd homes somewhere lovely.
Coupled with wage stagnation and austerity measures over the last 15 years, then house prices rocketing this all fuels homelessness.

Not entirely. Drugs and alcohol addiction is a huge reason behind it. My dh is a surveyor and he did a job for the ymca. Apparently in our town there enough beds in the shelters for all the homeless but they won't accept anyone with drugs or alcohol addiction in the interest of safety for staff and other residents.

jasjas1973

No I'm not, I gave my critism on the first page and said it would effectively turn into illinformed partisan shit and it has, people are trying to blame the death of the high street on austerity FFS without any contributing factors whatsoever, nor the realisation that the death of the high street started long before 210..

Homelessness is an issue, and there are many contributing factors at which Tories are partly to blame, there are others such as not deporting inactive migrants as per EU proposals, as is tighter regulation on dodgy HMO's.

UC is an issue in rollout, but despite that has cross party support so no can try and shame Tory voters as people who say that are obviously missinformed.

As for homeless eradicated under labour, well technically it's true, but all they did was move them out of big cities into already dying costal towns, now we can say that it wasn't true labour, but it shows the problem is far more multifaceted than 'evil tories' that some are so desperate to turn it into.

Nope it's Labour's fault for their uncontrolled immigration which led to a vast population increase

How so? Please, update us with your logically argument.

Homelessness has risen because of the massive increase in housing costs, reduction in wages, job insecurity and the lack of affordable housing. There are enough houses in physical terms - they just cost far too much.

Building more houses does fuck all because they’re still too expensive.

We need more housing to go back into public ownership. Then rents can be affordable and more secure. Councils still make money from affordable housing - there’s no economic reason for government to not own their own property and rent.

universal credit has resulted in more families and people being pushed into bed and breakfast, temporary accommodation. This means you see more people on the streets as they’re pushed out.

However, instead of the councils reinvesting that money into building more council housing, they squandered it or hid it

Incorrect.

There were (and remain) restrictions as to what could be done with the profits. Councils couldn’t use it - this was a massive reason for the inability of councils to build and replace what had been sold.

What a daft thing to say op?

To try and pin it on austerity and Tories shows a complete lack understanding

A lack of understanding of humanity. Austerity sucks for us poor types. Tories have 'a complete lack of understanding' as to how we live. Hopefully after Brexit you'll be unelectable for a generation.

I'm sure they are to blame but at the same time, these things take time.
Under Blair many smaller charities supporting homeless people, supporting v poor families were swamped and collapsed when a huge amount of desperately poor people came here when work restrictions for Eastern Europe were lifted... Many resources at the bottom couldn't cope and many people teetered over that brink. Also under labour the gap between rich and poor grew until brown got tax credits in.

Unfortunately the UK couldn't help the poor it already had and then under Blair, we then failed all the really poor people who came from Eastern Europe.

Blair should have got out house in order first.

District and Borough councils are responsible for housing those in need

but they are not allowed to build cheap houses for those people

they are forced to keep selling off good houses

and to pay "market" rents for private accommodation

if councils were allowed to build homes for rent then the whole of society would benefit

or if they were allowed to take over homes left empty for many years

A lack of understanding of humanity.

An appeal to emotion does not refute any of my points

Austerity sucks for us poor types. Tories have 'a complete lack of understanding' as to how we live. Hopefully after Brexit you'll be unelectable for a generation.

I'm a remainer for a start, I notice how you have skipped the part of the EU forcing austerity onto countries and that they have given France an out for next year so Macron can implement labour reform alarm Thatcher.

As I said, illinformed partisan shite.

Like Thatcher

Not alarm

I also see how you have neatly backed away from austerity and by your mindset Tories being responsible for the death of the high street

if councils were allowed to build homes for rent then the whole of society would benefit

This is true, and a big factor in this was by laws and of course nimby-ism which crosses political stripes.

But the Tories have introduced more powers to local councils to combat them and build more homes. They could have done more obviously but they have done some ground work

Justanotherlurker Its pointless going back in time, the crisis is now! & i don't get the EU argument, the vast majority have jobs and work, anyone falling into crisis isn't going to be able to rent a house (council or otherwise) or get a mortgage, so working migrants are not the cause.

Zevitevitchofcwsmas perhaps in certain areas but homelessness has risen across the UK in areas not affected by EU migrants, who, as i said almost all work

It just is not possible to de-link austerity and the present crisis in homelessness, which is now affecting far more than the usual drug and drink addicts.

Ref the high street? austerity may not have helped but i agree, it was in trouble long before 2010.

But the Tories have introduced more powers to local councils to combat them and build more homes

Not sure about that. The only substantive changes to enable more building has been recently - in the last year. And even then it is still not enough!