Council housing query

[user13842]

When there is a council housing shortage, why do Council’s not manage those living in the homes they have better? For example, I know of someone who lives on their own in a 3-bed council house in my area as their children have now left home. I also know of a family of 4 (2 parents, 2 children) who are living in a small 2 bed council flat. I appreciate this won’t cater for everyone but why do Council’s not routinely check up on who they are housing in what and encourage swaps where appropriate so that everyone is housed according to their needs? Appreciate it isn’t as straightforward as all that but surely it would be relatively easy to create a system to flag suitable swaps when they came up based on regular checks on circumstances.

I also know of a couple who were in council housing for a couple of years despite suddenly earning a lot of money and was very surprised the Council didn’t do regular checks on this to identify those who could afford private renting and move them on for those in need.

If you want to get into the housing benefit part of it. Shall we see how many people are in private rents and receiving housing benefits. Except that money's paying off someone's nest egg that only they benefit from.

So then you can say there's a subsidy but it applies to both. A hell of a lot of people in SH don't claim any benefits. The money goes back into where it should, rather in some greedy fuckers old age pension pockets.

You can't use housing benefit as a reason to target SH tenants.

People like to think that those in SH are also on benefits. It's weird.

I personally think that all housing stock should be seized and people shuffled about according to need. Whether they buy or rent. That's how ridiculous it sounds when people think those on SH are lower than them and poking their noses in where it's not needed or wanted.

If you want fairness. Target private landlords and their stupid rents and this attitude that they can just evict if they need the house back, as you see on thread after thread on here when a relationship breaks down. Nobody gives a toss about the tenants then

Council houses (and most housing association houses) are rented out on lifetime tenancies.

There are succession rights to some tenancies.

I lived in an ex-council house and my next door neighbour rented from the council. As their whole family rented when the mother died the son inherited the tenancy.

This means that once a council house is rented out to someone they have legal rights to stay there for their whole lifetime.

Wandsworth in London which is a very Tory area was experimenting with ten year council tenancies for a while. I'm not sure how it went but they seem to be back issuing lifetime ones now.

This means that legally the tenants are entitled to stay there for their lifetime, no matter how much they earn or whether you or anyone else thinks they deserve to be there.

The British state could change this. Labour don't want to. And the tories would rather let council housing wither away.

Well according to gov website, 75% are on some type of housing benefit in council housing? I mean I agree with SH and think we need stricter controls around rent in the private market, but you obviously feel unless someone agrees completely with you that they are some greedy capitalist who doesn’t care about others. The hilarious part about it is that I would have been entitled to apply for SH based my income in my younger years but I would imagine you would be deeply upset if I was given a council house then and I really don’t feel like I should be able to hold on to it as my income increase but I appreciate the points of view that others have articulated about it being people’s home. I’ve moved a lot for work opportunities though and that’s not for everyone I suppose.

Isn't it better people are in housing association properties if they get housing benefit?

Wouldn't you rather the housing benefit cost be £500 than £2000 if private rented?

Not anybody - you need to be a lower income to apply, so there is a restriction there, it’s not for everyone, what word would you like to use for incomes under a certain threshold?
Thanks for pointing out it’s not free - I have apologised for that!

Council houses aren't linked to income. Anyone can apply and I wouldn't give a toss if you were offered one or not. Of course I don't think the entire country is London like.

The private sector is out of control. Nobody is going to give up a secure tenancy for an insecure one. It's a simple problem to look at. Secure ALL tenancies, bring in rent control and people sitting on their lofty perches might settle down a bit.

I worked in social housing- reasons for not moving - loss of garden, issues with neighbourhoods, poor quality new builds especially noise, anti-social behaviour, cost of decorating, carpets, the removal, losing community / family links, transport issues, lack of infrastructure, rent being different due to age and type of social housing tenure, hatred of flats and service charges/ maintenance.... inept housing associations do not help, and it can take years to get action, so many prefer the devil they know and to stay in their 'home'. So there are multiple issues as to why downsizing is complex, and I've seen mental health badly affected by a poor exchange / downsize.

Yeah it's the leaving area.
Our neighbour was a lone elder men in 3 bed with big garden. He was not managing it BUT he had friends, gp, amenities etc right there. Plucking people out of their setting is actually detrimental to them.
What needs to be done is more options in the same area. Moving couple of streets is not as bad. Moving 20 min away on bus can be an issue

Well according to gov website you need to be earning under a certain threshold so yes then they are linked to income?

The fact that so few people are able to access social housing (I'm in London fwiw) sets up this sort of lottery where there are a few people who win it for life while others are left out on their own. The former group usually act like "why would you be so dumb as to pay overinflated private rents" completely ignoring their absolute privilege to live in central London for peanuts.

If I could change one thing about London SH it would be to move it from the borough councils: it does not make sense, point blank, to have SH in zone 1 London, under the current rules which prioritise people in need rather than, say, NHS surgeons needing to be in early for shifts or something.

Yes, right to buy has been a significant factor because councils were not allowed to use the money gained to replenish stocks.

While the developers like the ones who did Elephant and Castle get away with destroying social housing why are you still blaming tenants for not moving.

can you please provide one other example where ppl expected to move aside en masse for people they dont even know. Because this only seems to happen with social housing.

And re. bedroom tax Five years ago y"all were moaning about ppl not having a spare room to self isolate in. SH tenants will never be in the right no matter what we do!

We dont have a housing crisis We have an affordability crisis A £400,000 house is not going to help someone in temp accomodation

Then there is this

https://londonnewsonline.co.uk/news/residents-heartbroken-at-borough-with-4500-empty-homes-while-thousands-more-on-housing-wait-list/

Be very careful. If there is another pandemic it will be essential workers living in social housing keeping things going while you sit on your laptop saying they should be moved around like chess pieces. IMO next time they should refuse and lock down too!

Why on earth is it SH tenants fault that someone else has had loads of kids.

Then we have ppl like you moaning that ppl cant care for their elderly relatives because they have moved too far away. And moaning about what it costs in social care

It is not that easy to move, I wanted to swap when kids grew up, I contacted the HA, I had to apply all over again and bid for properties but am in a loong list way down so it will be years before i get anywhere. Homeswapper was no good either

MN.....................Social housing should only be for those in dire need
Also MN...........................not buying a house near there. That housing estate is a right ghetto full of druggies alkies and criminals.

Connect the fucking dots

Most social housing now seems to be managed by Housing Associations and they are worse than useless - inefficient and corrupt, with repairs not carried out as they should be and stock falling into disrepair. There should be a serious investigation into what has gone wrong with HAs.

you would think they would jump at the chance to free up a 3 bed semi and move me to a one bed flat but nope, commonsense out of the window

I am not blaming tenants only, I have acknowledged there are lots of other issues in my various posts, including social housing being reduced and councils lacking funding to fully utilise the properties they do have. Tenants refusing to move to a more suitable property for them is one of those issues though. Granted it is not one of the bigger ones but it is still an issue given the situation we are in with social housing. There are tenants who have requested a smaller home and are ignored when there are families living in homes too small for them - that is an issue with the Council’s management (mostly related to budget) which also needs addressed. I never suggested that the swaps would resolve the housing crisis completely. However it would help with those in need of social housing being housed appropriately for their circumstances.

It’s not people moving en masse, it’s suggesting people move into more appropriate housing when their circumstances change to ‘free up’ family sized homes for families that need the space not that suddenly all single people in multi bedroomed houses are kicked out. It’s a very selfish attitude to say ‘for people they don’t even know’, especially when you are benefiting off of a government initiative. These other people are also in need of the benefit of council housing, just as people who are already in the system are in need. It’s not as though people would be moving regularly - probably only once, maybe twice. Social housing is a managed system with benefits (as in positives not HB), private renting and owners do not have those benefits, so of course the way they are managed should be different.

There absolutely is an affordability crisis in the private sector in some areas of the country, both for buying and renting. It is a huge industry though so it’s not going to be resolved easily and social housing can’t just sit stagnant alongside it. Other than total reform of all housing, which is extremely unlikely, it is time to accept that it does not serve the same purpose it used to and change is needed to reflect that. This would mean a lot of work in the social housing sector and, having read the views of other PPs, funding and better management of tenancies would be required. Given the current state of the country, I'm not sure that’s possible either. We do, however, need to start somewhere. And maybe moving on people who can afford private rented accommodation and actually facilitating requested swaps is a good place to start.

Its not really about money. Its about ideology. On another thread someone talked about her friend who is a single mum with four kids who is being told she can work in Morrisons
Childcare paid, wages top up paid will cost more than if they left her alone.
Its not about money

This is clearly poor management by the Council. I obviously have no idea how mammoth the task would be to create a system to facilitate these swaps. Maybe an AI job. However, it is ridiculous that requests such as yours are made so difficult.

A woman I know requested a swap from her 2 bedroom flat to a 1 bed. Her adult child had married and left home. Four years later the woman’s still waiting for a swap. Her flat is HA, not council. The HAs seem to be incapable of any kind of efficiency.

How ignorant.

I was homeless for over a year. Myself, my son and my daughter had lived in the same private rented accommodation for over 10 years.

After being here 2 years, my son then aged 20 moved out, leaving me with 60-70£ bedroom tax per month.

My daughter is 16, if she doesn't go onto uni after Alevels but moves out, I'll be looking at circa £150 bedroom tax per month. I am physically disabled before anyone starts. So this all comes from benefit money.

We have been here nearly 10 years.

Should I just get downgraded to a 1 bedroom flat?

The truth is, that I am already looking to homeswap to a 2 bed. There are no incentives unless you completely give up your home and start bidding again to go anywhere.

It's not cushy, it's not a home for life unless you can pay for it. It's similar to being in private rented. With bedrooms comes price - from what is supposed to be the minimal amount you have to live on anyway.
It's a constant reminder that this house, is not my home.

This THIS is the truth. I recently had a new front door fitted to my flat. Suppossed to be a fire door which is suposed to self close. It doesnt yet my old one did. It has a gap underneath. The old one didnt.
The first door did what it was supposed to (self closed in four seconds) but i had a letter saying our tenancy agreement was under threat if we didnt let the "contractors" fit this new door.

Now when they do the next inspection it wont pass so they will be back and forth earning ££££££££ for each call out.

If this is replicated elsewhere that means working tenants @user13842 will then have to keep taking time off work. You cant go to work with your front door off.

This is just one example. There are loads more. I would love to know how many working tenants have actually LOST jobs due to the ineptness of HAs Bet this is one survey they will never do!