Matt Sellwood - Housing - affordable, sustainable and plentiful
12 April 2010
Over the last three decades, successive Governments have turned housing from a human right for all into a speculative market for the rich. The Green Party would turn the destructive policy framework of the last thirty years on its head, and return housing to the reach of ordinary people once again.
As Cllr Jenny Jones AM recently pointed out, the last decade alone has seen social housing waiting lists in London grow by over 80%, while stocks of affordable housing have actually decreased. A full 10% of all households in our capital city are now languishing on the waiting lists, waiting to be allocated a home that suits their needs. This dire housing situation is mirrored across the country.
Meanwhile, house prices remain out of the reach of most ordinary people. Despite a reduction in prices due to the recession, the house price to earnings ratio remains higher than its historical average - and significantly higher in hotspots such as London. Even much 'affordable' housing stretches the common sense definition of the term, with some shared ownership schemes requiring a minimum income threshold well above national average earnings.
The solutions to this housing crisis are not complex, despite attempts to make them appear so. The problems we face have been created by underinvestment in public housing, subsidy for second home ownership, encouragement of buy-to-let investment, and overriding faith in the private sector housing market to solve all problems. The solutions are simply the opposite of the failed policies of the establishment parties - namely support for a massive programme of investment in public housing, an end to subsidy for empty properties and second homes, a rebalancing of housing to focus on homes for people rather than investment opportunities, and a balance of delivery mechanisms for affordable housing. Owner-occupied housing and council housing are not the only options, although both have their place - alternatives such as cooperatively run and owned housing also need to be explored and supported.
In addition, the Green Party realises that affordable homes must be of the highest quality, both architecturally and environmentally. Properly designed neighbourhoods, with sufficient community infrastructure and green spaces, can drastically cut down on crime and anti social behaviour - while energy efficient homes reduce fuel poverty and help deal with climate change.
While other parties are offering only piecemeal reform, the Green Party is putting forward a comprehensive and holistic agenda for housing sanity. Among other policy measures, we would:
• resume direct investment in council housing, and allow local authorities to use receipts from sales to fund new accommodation. In particular, we would provide £4bn per annum to local authorities to expand social housing, mainly through conversion and renovation, and create 80,000 jobs.
• deal with the scandal of over 700,000 empty homes by pressing local government to use their powers to bring properties back into use, and do the same for central government stock.
• end the right to buy and introduce the right to rent. People facing severe difficulties with paying their mortgage and facing re-possession should have a right to rent their existing home as council housing.
• introduce a free home insulation programme for all homes that need it, with priority for pensioners and those living in fuel poverty, aiming to insulate 4 million homes every year. Such a programme would cost £4bn a year and create another 80,000 jobs.
• Introduce incentives totalling £2bn per annum to encourage homes to become more energy self-sufficient, by aiming for 1,000,000 solar roofs and support generous feed-in tariffs for micro-generation creating 40,000 jobs in the installation industries.
Housing policy which values homes for people over speculation by the wealthy is neither complex, nor difficult. It requires only the political will to deal with the scandal of current housing policy - the political will that only the Green Party is exhibiting.
Tweet
