SO 12 'trailblazing' local authorities are to offer advice on training, employment and childcare to people looking for housing. The CLG announcement on housing options yesterday puts one of the key recommendations of the Hills Report into effect.

But anyone looking for the advice may be confused if they take a closer look at the local priorities for councils it published earlier this week. 

Take childcare - a key factor restricting employment opportunities and housing options. Only four of the 12 trailblazers make 'take-up of formal childcare by low-income working families' a priority.

Take concentrations of people on benefit - a key concern on housing and worklessness. Only five prioritise 'working age people on out of work benefits in the worst performing neighbourhoods'.

Or what about the supply of affordable homes? Even on this most fundamental issue, only eight out of 12 make 'number of affordable homes delivered (gross)' a priority.

Failing to tick the right boxes and speak the right management speak does not of course mean that the 12 will not deliver excellent advice. However, there is a crucial point to be made about 'options'.

As used in homelessness prevention, it has led to some invaluable work on helping homelessness people sustain tenancies and access the private rented sector. However, a strong suspicion remains among many advisors that in some local authorities homelessness prevention is really about homelessness application prevention.

Many people getting 'advice' on their housing and employment 'options' will have similar suspicions running through their heads about the real motivations behind it. And only two of the 12 authorities (Greenwich and Calderdale) can demonstrate those motivations by pointing out they make priorities of all three of the indicators above.

Posted by Jules Birch, July 4

Posted in Hills review, Local government, Social housing, Welfare

EVER since Thursday's election the airwaves have been full of government ministers admitting mistakes, feeling our pain and listening to our problems. But there was not much evidence of any of that as housing minister Caroline Flint dead-batted away questions about the government's policy on new homes on the BBC yesterday.

The effects of the credit crunch on social housing at last made it into the national media in a report on yesterday's PM Programme - go here for the story or here to listen again (from about 15 minutes in).  Tom Dacey, chief executive of the Southern Housing Group, said on the programme that five out of seven lenders to social housing were taking on no new business.

And Matthew Wyles, executive director of non-retail at the Nationwide, said the shortage of funds had forced the building society to concentrate on what it was set up to do - lending to home buyers. 'At a time when we have to make hard choices, it's our core mortgage borrowers that will come first in our queue,' he said.

Toss into the mix a report by the Local Government Association that the economic slowdown and credit crunch could mean 2m households on waiting lists by 2010 and the effect of reductions in private sector starts on both the government's 3m homes by 2020 target and the section 106 programme and you have serious problems in the making.

Flint's reaction was to be 'a little bit surprised'. The government had already committed £8.4bn to social housing over the next three years while the Housing Corporation had already identified the £10bn in private finance needed to support it. While it was keeping a very close eye on the situation, it was acting to improve liquidity in the mortgage market and in the long term it was committed to the 3m homes target.

Her long-term forecast was that high employment and low interest rates will underpin the housing targets. 'We're making sure that when the market picks up - and it will pick up - we are in a position to hit the ground running.'

Flint may be right of course. The credit crunch may turn out to be a temporary blip and the market will return to normal - along with the opinion polls perhaps.

If she's wrong, though, all bets are off. Not just for the housing market, not just for the 3m homes target but for the many of the assumptions underpinning housing policy. Not least, following Thursday's election results, which party will be running it at the end of the current affordable housing programme in 2011. And what, following Boris's victory in London and the scrapping of Ken's 50% affordable homes target, will follow it. 

Posted by Jules Birch, May 6 

Posted in Finance, Local government, Social housing, Housebuilding

The boot was on the other foot today when Boris Johnson accused his Labour and Lib Dem rivals of pulling out of hustings in the election for London mayor.

Johnson said Ken Livingstone pulled out of the event organised by the Centre for Social Justice (CSJ) because he did not want to be questioned about grants to the voluntary sector. All of which made a change from Johnson pulling out of events and being accused of not wanting to be questioned about anything.

It might all have had something to do with the Centre for Social Justice not being quite the independent organisation Johnson made out. Independent in its thinking? Possibly. In its political affiliations? Hmm. It is run by former Conservative leader Iain Duncan Smith. 

None of which does much to advance the debate on a crucial issue for the future of housing policy. The CSJ has made much of the running on the Conservative side on the issue of welfare dependency, building on publication of last year's Breakthrough Britain. You may have noticed that the welfare reform wing of the Labour Party, including housing minister Caroline Flint, has also turned its attention to worklessness.

The big difference between them seems to be that social housing is very much at the heart of the Labour debate whereas it does not get a mention in Breakthrough London, the CSJ pamphlet published this week on social inequality in the capital which predictably stresses the importance of marriage and the two-parent family.

It would have been interesting to see whether Livingstone, Johnson (and Duncan Smith) agree with Flint's plans to penalise tenants who do not seek work - and what Duncan Smith thinks of Johnson's plans to extend housing subsidies to all Londoners paying basic rate income tax. Both would be good indications of the likely direction of a crucial debate whoever wins the next (general) election. 

Posted by Jules Birch, April 16 

Posted in Local government, Politics , Welfare

THE HOUSING and Regeneration Bill completed its report stage in the Commons on Monday but not before the government had fought off two determined attempts by Labour rebels to level the playing field for council housing and not without a welter of government amendments addressing everything from the regulation of housing assocations to the position of tolerated trespassers and shared ownership enfranchisement.

Council housing dominated most of the debate as a succession of Labour MPs like Austin Mitchell and Michael Meacher launched a bid to win more resources for local authorities that retain their stock. Although they won Lib Dem support that amendment was easily defeated. However, the rebels also wanted to tighten up the rules on stock transfer ballots that Mitchell said were being conducted on the basis of 'bribery, bamboozlement and bullying'. That was backed by the Conservatives too, ensuring a much narrower 263-210 result.

However, the rules on ballots could yet be changed. Junior housing minister Iain Wright admitted that 'at times, the information provided has been slightly one-sided' and promised more talks and possible amendments later.

The same goes for ground 8, the controversial fast-track procedure that means the courts must grant possession orders to housing associations whatever the circumstances - even, for example, where rent arrears are caused by delays in housing benefit payments. Former Conservative housing minister Sir George Young proposed an amendment banning social landlords from using it.

The government did not accept that but Wright acknowledged that 'there remain concerns about the actions of a small minority of RSLs and other private sector landlords'. CLG officials will meet Shelter, Citizens Advice, the Council of Mortgage Lenders, the Housing Corporation and National Housing Federation in a working group to recommend options for a way forward by the summer.

As for the Federation's main concern, regulation that it claimed would interfere with associations' independence, that seems to have been assuaged by an amendment spelling out when the regulator should and should not intervene. Wright said: 'We are reinforcing the view that the Secretary of State’s role should be limited to strategic directions, with direct influence only on key issues such as rent, physical maintenance and tenant empowerment, which is right. The regulator’s standards should be outcome focused wherever possible, should not threaten the status of charitable providers and, crucially, should take account of the desirability of registered social landlord boards managing their own business and setting their own corporate direction.'

Posted by Jules Birch, April 1 

Posted in Legal, Local government, Politics

KEN LIVINGSTONE makes his 50% affordable housing target a key part of his platform to win a third term as London mayor in a manifesto launched this morning. Livingstone says plans by his Tory rival Boris Johnson to drop the 50% and set unit targets for individual boroughs instead represents a 'backward-looking view of London' and would 'concentrate housing policy in high priced and luxury development - pricing housing out of the hands of ordinary Londoners'.

Alongside crime, housing has its highest profile in years in the mayoral election and provides a preview of the likely shape of the debate in the next general election. Both Livingstone and Johnson have pledged to deliver 50,000 affordable homes by 2011 - though by different routes.

In a manifesto launched two weeks ago, Johnson promised a big expansion of shared ownership and a new FirstSteps housing scheme using public sector land and grant to deliver homes at 20% below market cost. He argued that Livingstone's 'rigid and cosmetic targets have, more often than not, stifled development and suppressed the growth of affordable housing'.

But Livingstone hit back today with an indictment of the record of Conservative-controlled boroughs like Wandsworth (11 per cent of affordable housing built last year), Westminster (11 per cent), Barnet (10 per cent) and Redbridge (50% target recommended in an independent report cut to 25%).

Livingstone's strong suit is his record. Both the number of new homes and the number of affordable new homes have doubled in London since he became mayor in 2000. It will certainly be hard for Johnson to argue that dropping compulsion against the boroughs will deliver more. 

It's hard to see how Johnson's plan to increase shared ownership and sub-market housing will not mean fewer rented homes. But it could benefit more voters. Anyone earning less than the £34,600 threshhold for 40% tax would potentially be eligible.

However, both candidates may struggle to deliver on their 50,000 pledge if the housing market downturn continues. The National House-Building Council revealed on Friday that registrations of new homes in the three months December to February were down 22% on a year ago. 

Posted by Jules Birch, Mar 31 

Posted in Local government, Politics