It’s a really thorny issue. It’s easy to sit there as a comfortable person with secure housing and somehow villainise the poor (we’ve been doing it for centuries after all) as somehow being at fault for their poorer opportunity in life, and also just being awful people who are causing others to live in even more hardship. The reality is of course that many of us are one dodgy corporate reorg away from the breadline ourselves.
When it comes to social housing, the reality is that the supply/demand issue is rooted in right to buy, loads of the social housing in my hometown was bought off and later sold at handsome profit.
My parent is still in the council house I grew up in. It is bigger than they need, especially after the sudden death of the other parent, who had the stronger claim to that property although it’s a joint tenancy. We did talk about and prepare for downsize, as the assumption was that would be expected but there doesn’t seem to be anything to move them to. I think if a realistic option were presented it would be an easy move, and I know they hate the idea that others might be in need.
The thing that treating humans like livestock who can just be shipped around misses though is that people don’t exist in isolation, they are communities, and this is especially important when they get older. The 50s and 60s saw London’s East End decimated and people shipped out to newer housing in the suburbs. The housing was often much better but the communities were fractured which was disastrous for the people. So downsizing needs to be geographically relevant, and that really means the same town or part of it.
None of the issues faced by those in private rental are in any way the fault of those in social housing - that’s caused by market factors, mortgage rates, taxation of property income, and rising costs. All of which get passed on through market rate increases.