@LuluJakey1
It's far more complex than you suggest I am guessing too from your comments that you're unaware of exactly how and why we have such low housing stock.
It wasn't JUST people buying council houses and taking them out of the stock, it was decisions and legislation by central govt to:
Stop properly maintaining the ones that were left
Stop allowing councils to replace housing stock - they were effectively banned from doing so. It wasn't and isn't because they don't want to!
We need to build affordable, decent council housing that remans as affordable decent council housing so people do not feel pressure to saddle themselves with 25 years of debt.
I totally agree
I also agree that our perspective on buying v renting is faulty and that's reinforced by how differently buyers and renters are treated.
Buyers can pretty much do what they like even to the direct detriment of others eg letting a flat go to ruin in a block and it affecting the stability and maintenance of the whole block (although here in Scotland we have some processes and laws that generally prevent that from occurring and tend to hold owners to SLIGHTLY higher standards and this is normal in our culture and has been for some years)
Renters meanwhile are treated as if they are at best an inconvenience and at worst as if the landlord is providing them with charity! There are few renters rights and what there are tend to be very poorly regulated and enforced.
Discrimination against tenants on benefits - which while now officially illegal landlords and agencies etc are still exploiting loopholes to exclude them from getting a home
Revenge evictions - where tenants are illegally evicted for daring to request the most minimal basic repairs and maintenance
Evictions without due process - in my area there's been in our local news about a particular landlord/agency who has apparently been taking deposits and first months rent and then in that first month changing the locks on tenants and throwing them out for no reason without even allowing them access to fetch their belongings. They've apparently been targeting less assertive, less informed tenants, mainly those with mild learning disabilities or women fleeing dv as they're less likely to know their rights and/or are reluctant to attempt to make sure they get them.
Poor quality and frankly unsafe housing of course.
I think I said already upthread but I personally think "landlord" should be a protected, regulated and maybe licensed profession.
Some Scots councils have lists of approved landlords etc but it's not a unified and overseen idea.
And just where do you expect food to be grown? The UK isn't one big building plot, the countryside isn't wasteland.
I agree and it ties in nicely with the premise of the thread.
Before more land is developed we need to bring back into housing stock as homes to be lived in permanently:
2nd homes
Properties being left lying empty permanently
Derelict and property in disrepair - there are 2 entire high rise tower blocks in the nearest town to me that have been allowed to fall into a terrible state, such a waste! Nobody will even invest the money to demolish and rebuild on the sites!
Former commercial properties that could be adapted or even again demolished and repurposed. There's a defunct ferry terminal area I'm aware of that apparently is suitable for building flats on but nobody will put the money in.
Shelter have been incredibly helpful to me when I have been in need of their services and I now take an interest in that charity and other homelessness charities and that even the properties that aren't second homes but are potential homes lying empty/unusable is also well into 100,000's (I understand it's a difficult statistic to accurately assess)
I've said on many threads on here that a good, properly planned social housing development strategy would have so so many benefits for the country
1 the obvious provision of homes
2 the creation of jobs and training opportunities - in so many ways not just trades work which is of course where many without academic ability often have a knack and ability to learn, but also all the associated industries! Materials provision, engineers, architects, admin support , logistics etc it would honestly create loads of jobs
3 a stimulus to the economies where social housing is most needed - as they are so often of course the same areas where there are few jobs, so the population isn't spending, which means shops and cafes etc struggle to find and maintain business
It seems utterly bonkers to me NOT to do it