Social Cleansing

[Snoopy]

A London council has been accused of starting "social cleansing" in the capital by asking a Stoke-on-Trent housing association to take on up to 500 families on housing benefit.
Newham Council says it can no longer afford to house tenants on its waiting list in private accommodation.

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-17821018

 
See also Harlow, Chelmsford, Basildon, Welwyn Garden City, Letchworth, Milton Keynes, Basingstoke etc etc.
"There is nothing new under the sun" as me old mum used to say.

[Miss Demeanour]

Newham has obviously made the headlines as the Olympic borough and it makes good news to call these people ‘Olympic Exiles’.

In our borough private rents for an average two bedroom property costs approx £525 per week and the London average is about £317 per week.

The Housing Benefit Caps are :-

•   £250 for one-bed
•   £290 for two-bed
•   £340 for three-bed
•   £400 for four-bed and larger properties

So those residents that rely solely on Housing Benefit to pay their rent are having to source alternative accomodation.
Council supply is scarce to non existant.  Allocations policies are being rewritten all over so that Councils will only have a ‘duty’ to rehouse those most in need. General waiting lists no longer exist .

This is the tip of the iceberg as the expectation from many is that they have a 'right' to 'suitable' housing and that this should be where they choose to live.

[Marley's Ghost (Imbiber of Spirits)]

Newham has obviously made the headlines as the Olympic borough and it makes good news to call these people ‘Olympic Exiles’.

In our borough private rents for an average two bedroom property costs approx £525 per week and the London average is about £317 per week.

The Housing Benefit Caps are :-

•   £250 for one-bed
•   £290 for two-bed
•   £340 for three-bed
•   £400 for four-bed and larger properties

So those residents that rely solely on Housing Benefit to pay their rent are having to source alternative accomodation.
Council supply is scarce to non existant.  Allocations policies are being rewritten all over so that Councils will only have a ‘duty’ to rehouse those most in need. General waiting lists no longer exist .

This is the tip of the iceberg as the expectation from many is that they have a 'right' to 'suitable' housing and that this should be where they choose to live.

Ahh, this is the real issue though, isn't it?

[Snoopy]

Newham has obviously made the headlines as the Olympic borough and it makes good news to call these people ‘Olympic Exiles’.

In our borough private rents for an average two bedroom property costs approx £525 per week and the London average is about £317 per week.

The Housing Benefit Caps are :-

•   £250 for one-bed
•   £290 for two-bed
•   £340 for three-bed
•   £400 for four-bed and larger properties

So those residents that rely solely on Housing Benefit to pay their rent are having to source alternative accomodation.
Council supply is scarce to non existant.  Allocations policies are being rewritten all over so that Councils will only have a ‘duty’ to rehouse those most in need. General waiting lists no longer exist .

This is the tip of the iceberg as the expectation from many is that they have a 'right' to 'suitable' housing and that this should be where they choose to live.

All perfectly reasonable ~ local authority rent officers can view properties and decide what is the correct rent. The long term effect will be that some people will return to their own countries, some will return to the counties they came from (thinking that the streets of London are paved with gold), some landlords will adjust their rents in accordance with Rent Officers guidelines and in a year or two the whole thing will have settled down. Those who sought to make a living out of their rental properties will find that they can no longer afford their buy to let mortgages, usually obtained by over inflated guestimates of achievable rental income, and be forced into selling in  a "flat" housing market. This will determine the true value (which is, as we all know, what you can actually sell it for NOT what you think it is worth) of their houses ~ this will lead to more people being able to afford the properties that will be repossessed and sold at auction.

Like I said in my O.P. seen it all before. History does really have a habit of repeating itself.

As for the Labour Party's bleating about the "Angels of Mercy" (nurses) and other "Heroes" of the "Essential Services", Housing Benefits will still be available if their income means they cannot afford a rented property that is being let at what the Rent Officers consider to be a reasonable monthly sum.

[Miss Demeanour]

The advice from our authority is :-


Where there is going to be a shortfall between the rent you are charged and the cap level, you should try to negotiate a lower level of rent with your landlord.   

If your landlord will not re-negotiate your rent, you should try to pay the shortfall from your savings or income.   

This will be more practical where the shortfall is small but where there is a large shortfall the best option in the longer term will be for you to find cheaper accommodation. 

If you do not make up the shortfall in your rent, take insufficient action to resolve the situation and are evicted for rent arrears, you will be considered intentionally homeless.


So move or be damned then 

Landlords here will not be reducing rents, they have plenty of potential tenants and the available stock is limited . The Rent Officer round these parts was mainly only used to assess Housing Benefit claims which are now largely redundant and support statutory tenants ( of which few remain).

However the message seems to be taking a long time to be accepted by the majority affected. I had a woman screaming at me this morning because I had withdrawn a legal notice on her Landlord that had required her to be rehoused due to her overcrowding. She had been offered a flat with enough bedrooms to accomodate her family but because it was on the 10th floor of a new build property and her husband didn't like lifts and it was too far from her 'support network' she refused this.

I informed her that her landlord had complied and had tried to resolve the situation and therefore he had met the requirements of the notice. She has gone ballistic and is obviously going to her MP, raising formal complaints etc etc etc. She is being 'discriminated against and living in her current conditions is against her human rights etc.

 

[Tipsy Gipsy]

Could be worse, they could have been offered Werstshire. 

[Marley's Ghost (Imbiber of Spirits)]

The advice from our authority is :-


Where there is going to be a shortfall between the rent you are charged and the cap level, you should try to negotiate a lower level of rent with your landlord.   

If your landlord will not re-negotiate your rent, you should try to pay the shortfall from your savings or income.   

This will be more practical where the shortfall is small but where there is a large shortfall the best option in the longer term will be for you to find cheaper accommodation. 

If you do not make up the shortfall in your rent, take insufficient action to resolve the situation and are evicted for rent arrears, you will be considered intentionally homeless.


So move or be damned then 

Landlords here will not be reducing rents, they have plenty of potential tenants and the available stock is limited . The Rent Officer round these parts was mainly only used to assess Housing Benefit claims which are now largely redundant and support statutory tenants ( of which few remain).

However the message seems to be taking a long time to be accepted by the majority affected. I had a woman screaming at me this morning because I had withdrawn a legal notice on her Landlord that had required her to be rehoused due to her overcrowding. She had been offered a flat with enough bedrooms to accomodate her family but because it was on the 10th floor of a new build property and her husband didn't like lifts and it was too far from her 'support network' she refused this.

I informed her that her landlord had complied and had tried to resolve the situation and therefore he had met the requirements of the notice. She has gone ballistic and is obviously going to her MP, raising formal complaints etc etc etc. She is being 'discriminated against and living in her current conditions is against her human rights etc.

 

the sad thing is . . . . .

. . . .  She'll probably win!

[Miss Demeanour]

Those who shout loudest generally do eventually 

[beerhead]

Perhaps she and her husband should be offered free permanent sterilisation in return for ground floor accommodation ?

[Marley's Ghost (Imbiber of Spirits)]

Perhaps she and her husband should be offered free permanent extermination in return for ground floor accommodation ?

Fixed it for you.     

[Miss Creant Commander of the picklement and baking BAb(Hons)]

Completely off topic but Marley I know that you are a ghost and all that but I can't see you.

[Darwins Selection]

Completely off topic but Marley I know that you are a ghost and all that but I can't see you.

^^^^^^^^^
Wot she said, Mr Red Cross

On topic; we will never get rid of the concept of 'rights' to free housing etc.
Every concession just moves the ratchet one step further, usually toward the "Rivers of Blood" Powellscape. 

[Miss Creant Commander of the picklement and baking BAb(Hons)]

Newham has obviously made the headlines as the Olympic borough and it makes good news to call these people ‘Olympic Exiles’.

In our borough private rents for an average two bedroom property costs approx £525 per week and the London average is about £317 per week.

The Housing Benefit Caps are :-

•   £250 for one-bed
•   £290 for two-bed
•   £340 for three-bed
•   £400 for four-bed and larger properties

So those residents that rely solely on Housing Benefit to pay their rent are having to source alternative accomodation.
Council supply is scarce to non existant.  Allocations policies are being rewritten all over so that Councils will only have a ‘duty’ to rehouse those most in need. General waiting lists no longer exist .

This is the tip of the iceberg as the expectation from many is that they have a 'right' to 'suitable' housing and that this should be where they choose to live.

Ahh, this is the real issue though, isn't it?

There is a rather lovely house in Marlborough which I would like to live in and an even better one in Lymington.

I attended 14 different schools all in different places before I was 18.  I wasn't expelled from a single one of them.

The longest that I have lived anywhere is 7 years normally it was 2. I didn't have a social network and family around me and I'm perfectly normal.

Send the lot of them to Wales, Scotland or the Isle of Wight and be damned.

[Snoopy]

Leave the IoW out of this. It is far too lovely a place to be ruined by them.