Social Housing cuts
October 20th, 2010
Government plans to slice 60% off the affordable housebuilding budget and fill the gap by asking new social housing tenants to pay much higher rents were attacked by housing groups for hitting the “poorest hardest”.
https://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2010/oct/20/spending-review-2010-key-points#Social%20Housing
Well sadly the writing has been on the wall since 9th July 2009 when Paul Waugh, then of the Evening Standard, exposed the policies of Hammersmith and Fulham council which became the flagship Tory borough from which the present government took their ideas and are now in the process of implementing them. It is not that we should be surprised it is that I am bitterly disappointed that in view of the opposition expressed they have not stopped to reconsider.
My view? I think they’ll have to build prefabs, but that’s just me. Some of the WWII ones are still standing:-
https://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2008/sep/24/heritage.britishidentity
UPDATE: Ok, that’s not what they’re doing, they have been block booking b&b’s at the seaside instead
https://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2010/oct/24/exodus-poor-families-from-london
Letters to the Guardian.
A council house is also a home
- The Guardian, Wednesday 20 October 2010
- Article history
Nothing fills me with more despair than the proposal to move people out of social housing (Spending review, 19 October). My parents were housed in a council house in Streatham in 1948. They had three children and we had three bedrooms, my two brothers sharing one room. My parents worked all their lives, my mother as a telephonist and my father as a telephone engineer. They never earned enough to buy a house, but they paid their rent, always on time, and looked after the house properly. The house was lovely, built to Labour’s postwar housing standards (later abandoned by the Tories). Us kids grew up and moved on and my parents stayed there until my mother died in 1998, 50 years after they had moved in. My father died three years before her. Yes, the house was too big for her, but she liked to invite her children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren to stay.
[letter continues . . . to read the rest click the link below]
https://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2010/oct/20/council-house-also-a-home
I have walked round the Excalibur Estate as it is not far from where I live. Whenever I have walked round it have felt a really strange sensation in so far as I feel I have gone back in time…to a time way before I was born.
Over the years there have been several campaigns to pull it down but a lot of the residents, not all, are elderly and have lived there years and are extremely happy there.
Be interesting to see 10 years from now what actally happpens to this estate.
Just been reading up more on this… for a very different perspective on it http://the-excalibur-prefabs-estate-catford.webs.com/ it is worrying to read about the cold, damp but most of all asbestos! From everything I’ve read today I think it will be redeveloped soon.
My understanding is that asbestos sheet is only harmful when cut or drilled thereby releasing dust particles which may be inhaled. Otherwise it is harmless. That is why there are plenty of examples of safe asbestos sheet inside buildings around the UK untouched. This sounds to me like an excuse by developers keen to get their hands on some land to build crummy poky single aspect flats and kick off the existing residents.
Thank you for educating me about asbestos.
What makes you think they would be single aspect flats? ……….. there are many new flats today that are not single aspect ( yes they are at fault in lots of ways… but usually simply as they are too small!!)
Also it is clear that damp is an issue too on the Excalibur Estate.
Many of the people on this estate are very elderly ….. I can see that it would be heart breaking for them to go, as they have contributed so much to the well being of the estate and they feel secure as they have gardens.
I don’t feel it is right to move people in their elderly years… it would be too much of a shock and spoil their lives
….. but ultimately yes I do think this estate needs to come down, the homes are cold and damp now (quite badly so) that will only get worse over the years.
…..and after all they were only designed to be up for a few years anyway. Unless Lewisham council really addresses the issues of the cold and damp these homes will need to demolished.
Having said that it would be lovely if the council did repair work to preserve this estate……… I think councils work to strict budgets and it would be cheaper and more beneficial for residents of the future to rebuild….. but immense compassion needs to be shown for the residents of the present…
I think that the elderly would only be offered poky single aspect rooms, no developer is going to build large flats for them. That’s on the basis that the estate is indeed composed mainly of elderly residents. I do not doubt your words that the prefabs are suffering from neglect, they have long outlived their design life but now is not the time to be looking for council money to replace them.