To think people dont understand the magnitude of the social housing crisis?

[Arrowfanatic]

I work in social housing. We have endless requests for moves from customers who expand their family whilst in a property which is unsuitable to move them to a bigger property. We advise that family size housing (3 bed+) has a waiting list of around 10+ years and then these customers get mad.

We're accused of allowing them to stay in overcrowded properties, or affecting their mental & physical health and inevitably an overcrowded property becomes prone to damp & mould as it's too full.

These customers also want these houses in the exact location they desire, thereby limiting even more their chances of a move.

We get so demoralised when every day it's the same thing, but social housing is at a massive shortfall for the needs of the country & family size housing is in an even greater shortfall.

My company has an extensive plan to build more properties but it's a 5 year plan!

It's like they think we're lying to them, or the old classic of "you housing immigrants straight away" note, we dont, they have to apply like everyone else. We dont want our customers in unsuitable accommodation, and we really work hard on making the housing stock we do have work.

If you're in this position what could we tell our customers to make them understand the position we are in, and the one they have put themselves in and why we cant help as quickly as they would like.

I feel like I say "we have a shortage of family size housing" 100 times a day & get yelled at 100 times a day for our association not caring.

Agree with you @goodgodingovan. There are plenty of professionals who work with vulnerable groups who don't get shouted at. It's the OP's poor response to her client base that ensures this happens to her, which means she's not as effective as she should be ie isn't doing her job properly.

And yy of course vulnerable groups often make poor life choices. But if they could be making better choices they would be doing so. And they aren't making poor choices as some kind of dastardly plan to piss off the op, nor are they having a good time because of it.

@coldwarenigma yy agree that it's the private rental market that's subsidised. Costs us £12 billion a year in topups to meet what private landlords charge their tenants.

The legal aid agency have a rule that they would pay for legal services if it would be something a reasonable privately paying client would pay- this stops people getting legal aid for idiotic cases. I had to do a stint in housing department and the calls to rolls made about wanting legal advice because the council had provided a house but without a garden and when asked why it needed a garden “because I have children” was the answer. If people who have to buy their house have to move away from where they grew up, but smaller, no garden and actually plan on how many children they have why are others entitled to social housing? It is should be a fall back for those who genuinely fall on hard times, not people who feel they are entitled to it.

“People who are actually homeless are a priority. I know your situation is not ideal but you are not homeless and you have a safe place to live while you work out your next move.” ... and then I referred them to a service that assists people access private rentals.
I’ve worked in SH in Australia in a desirable area so very limited stock for the number of applicants. People have actually threatened to kill me because I can’t magic up a four bedroom, detached house in a nice area close to their kid’s school/mosque/mum/new boyfriend. Of course they’re already living in a two bed unit that they were allocated when they only had one child and were living in a homeless hostel.
In all honesty some people are just not going to listen to reason. Emotionally detach, give them the facts and ask them to leave if they kick off.

I'm not sure how pp's are assuming I am bad at my job and this is why people are shouting at me. They are usually shouting when I'm telling them what they dont want to hear which is "I'm sorry I am unable to provide the property you want but we have no vacancies and an extremely long waiting list". I deal with a lot of people who escape DV and I fucking wish I could put every single one in a home that's right for them but I cant. However people who have had 4 kids in a one bed flat who scream that we have a duty to rehouse them are very hard to deal with because they dont want to hear that the waiting list is 10 years long or that we have to offer to the councils housing list first or that they need to try to source a mutual exchange, they want a house that suits them and they want it urgently. The fact is, there isn't enough social housing, yelling at me when you dont get the answer you want wont change that.

For what it's worth, I grew up in poverty so I DO know what it's like! Not that it has any baring on this thread, but I remember going to bed hungry & in multiple layers of clothes with frost on the inside of the window! Assuming because of my job that I dont know what it's like is presumptuous and part of the problem as it shows you're ignoring the message I was putting across which is that people dont understand the pressures SH are under and immediately assume it's just the HA being awkward or unhelpful.

How many families (with children) could you emergency house in one day? E,g if they were evicted, homeless etc

In my local authority, families are spending weeks and weeks in temporary accommodation, which is usually a B&B, and in the area of the neighbouring council. Sometimes there's no temp accommodation in the whole fucking county, and they get placed approx 60-70 miles away, at the far side of the neighbouring county. If they have a job, they have the choice of a horrendous cross country commute, mostly on non-dual carriageway roads or jacking it in.

They then frequently spend 3-4 years in "long term temporary accommodation" usually flats, often not big enough for the size of the family. (One young couple on my caseload spent a year in a tiny studio flat with a baby, they only got rehoused when the HV kicked up a stink that the baby was at risk of developmental delay - she wasn't crawling because there wasn't enough floor space for her to crawl on, ffs).

Then, if they're lucky, they might get a permanent home.

Families are understandably reluctant to switch schools, leave jobs etc so they often turn down B&B in favour of staying with family/friends. That means the LA has discharged its homelessness duty by making them an offer of accommodation and they are no longer in the top priority band for social housing.

Brighton council now leases property from private landlords to house families that they have a statutory duty to accommodate. These are often outside the city in neighbouring council areas. A former client of mine was told by her housing officer that she would be unlikely to get a council/HA house before her youngest (then 8) was an adult.

I am in SH and I appreciate it every single day I am so lucky
I rented all my adult life before I got the house I am in now and I waited a long time

For all the hype about the lack of SH when I was bidding I did think people couldn’t have been very desperate - they were all bidding on the £220+ per week brand new housing in a village with a train station

Whereas the house I bid on is in a village with no train station and is 5 years old and I was the only bidder and won

Also noticed the same maisonette on there for weeks with no bids - was less than £80pw but in a not so lovely (but not that bad) end of a village. Clearly wasn’t good enough for anyone

My DM tried to swap her large house for a flat and it was horrendous - people were just awful. And I’ve heard really bad things about swaps and I know I will have to try to downsize swap one day and kind of dreading having nosy people who won’t commit to anything traipsing in and out

*the maisonette was too small for me but I saw it on the list!

Me and DS aged 5 live in a 2 bed council house. I wouldn't dream now of expanding my family. I couldn't afford too!!

However, others, and they tend to be the "vocal minority" don't understand the concept of "living within your means"

I work in Housing and I completely understand where OP is coming from. We can't facilitate the rapid expansion of families. No matter how many children you have I can't magic up a house tomorrow.

I sympathise OP

Last time I was at the GP, I was quite concerned for her!

It sounds as if people are calling their homes “unacceptable” when they are what most of us get through private renting anyway?

I don’t understand right to buy and I don’t understand why, for example, someone on
Bob Crow’s salary was entitled to social housing, if its true that he had it.

The block opposite is social housing, it’s a friendly street so lots of chat. They seem to get refurbished quite often? My kitchen would be considered an ancient disgrace, I think it’s about 35 years old, but it works, which is point.

I had to run a dehumidifier constantly in a previous private rented.

I’m nit suggesting a race to the bottom, or that bad luck doesn’t happen but 8 children isn’t bad luck. Maybe if you were a serial killer in a previous life 😂

People in social housing don't realise how lucky they have it. I live in fear of not bugging my landlord in case he thinks I'm a nuisance and puts my rent up/decides he no longer wants to rent

To the posters suggesting that the OP is somehow at fault, I work as a nurse now and tell people lots of things they don’t want to hear but I don’t get the same furious responses as when I worked in SH. For people living in inadequate, overcrowded housing it is the most important thing in the world to them and if they see you as the gatekeeper to a nicer place, all their stress is your fault.

You sound as if you're blaming them for their circumstances.

@goodgodingovan they are the only people to blame.

Who’s to blame, the State for not providing enough social housing, or people who expect the State to sort out their lives

A small, but significant, proportion of people are unable to "sort out their lives". They may have mental health problems, be fleeing DV or simply lack the necessary life skills. Even if they're quite together, lack of references or poor credit rating can make it really difficult for them to rent in the private sector. Physical disability may mean there's no suitable private accommodation.

In much of the south-east, rents have increased faster than wages, and the low-paid no longer earn enough to meet affordability criteria when a 2-bed property costs a grand a month.

It's shit, and I'm glad I'm not in that line of work any more.

goodgodingovan they are the only people to blame

🙄

@goodgodingovan

Are they not responsible a little bit? Doesn't mean they should be treated without respect. I don't think OP is treating them without respect, just saying that she is finding it difficult to be blamed for something that is systemic combined with some individual sub optimal choices

I don’t think there is anything you can tell them other than the facts.

You are fighting a tabloid and social media narrative about immigrants at the front of the queue, about women having multiple children and getting big homes, about teenagers becoming pregnant just to get a house etc. You will never beat that.

Meanwhile local authorities are trying to meet demand with an ever decreasing budget, building more and more flats and fewer accessible bungalows.

All you can do is manage expectations, be sympathetic and hope the majority of people can see you are doing your best.

Peoples perceptions vs reality are often very skewed

I deal with complaints a lot in healthcare and 9/10 everything they tell me is over exaggerated and easily disproved by facts. People don’t think rationally when they get emotional and often you need to try to get them to stand back and look at it more rationally. Sometimes I can manage to do this and sometimes I can’t and get yelled at. I got shouted at today after I had gone out of my way to help someone, there was no need for them to escalate their anger again but they couldn’t seem to help it. It can be demoralising to try to help someone and then still get shouted at

For instance we can do a survey of something and people will say ‘I’m always on hold for at least an hour’ but the phone system never shows any calls on hold for 1 hour

Provide more incentives for smaller families, whether elderly whose family have flown the nest or anyone living alone to move out of 4 bed houses and free them up for families

My council already offers £1,000 per excess bedroom given up for people who are downsizing. Unfortunately, the properties they need most are 2-bed properties, and very few people want to downsize from 2-bed to a one-bed, they presume because the one beds are almost all flats (there are a few one-bed bungalows, but they go to people with disabilities). Two-bed properties have, historically, been the ones they are most short of, and this has been made worse by the bedroom tax, because they can no longer house people with 2 children, under 10, of opposite sexes in a 3-bed.

I don’t know how my neice managed to get a lovely 2 bed council house. She bought her flat just before they closed the chance to (in Scotland) but she and her partner broke up. It was her council flat then he moved in joint mortgage. She moved out (he wouldn’t) few weeks later she’s got a brand new house. Now they are back together and renting out don’t think that’s fair when there’s families in shoddy private rentals.

Right to buy was the worst thing ever, people buying their council flats for 6K (my aunt bought hers outright in cash). Now worth over 100K but homes like these were never replaced. All the good areas all got bought up leaving only the rough areas no one really wants to live in, that created the council house stigma.

JESUS I REALLY DO WASTE MY FUCKING TIME ON HERE

OP If you work in social housing a couple of questions.

Why do HAs keep sending the same "multi skilled operatives" who lack knowledge out time and time again ...why are tenants made to have them back in their homes time and time again. Even when work is shoddy and dangerous.

What is your HAs contingency plan should (God forbid) a disaster on the scale of Grenfell happen again.

What is your HAs interpretation of disability equality duty?

DM.desperatw to downsize from 3.bed to 1. Council would not entertain as she was adequately housed..Next council 8 miles actually pays peope to downsize!

A good part of the housing crisis has been caused by developers pulling down social housing and replacing it with "affordable" housing

The Elephant and Castle neighbourhood is being physically, socially and ethnically transformed. This started with the demolition of the Heygate estate, a classic for stigmatised perceptions of council housing and the people who live in it. As the local 35% Campaign has meticulously documented, a succession of promises to Heygate residents were broken to arrive at a situation where 1,214 council homes were demolished, to be replaced with 2,704 new homes, of which only 82 (3%) are for social rent. The HA partner was London and Quadrant. To be eligible for the cheapest one-bedroom home built by them on the Heygate site, people needed a minimum household income of £57,500. The average household income in that part of Southwark is £24,324

That is one example I have many more