Anyone of the view that Labour politicians are in favour of helping the least well off in society might want to reconsider after studying proposals put forward by Frank Field last week.
The backbencher has introduced a private members bill to Parliament that he claims would create a ‘premier league’ for housing allocation, where well behaved members of society would get precedence over their less respectable peers, regardless of need.
Under Mr Field’s plans ‘good citizens’ who fall into the six priority categories for the allocation of social housing would be given homes before other families. Writing for Inside Housing he even suggests respectable families who do not fall into priority categories could get precedence over poorly behaved families who meet the normal criteria.
Clearly this would create a few problems. Who decides who is a good citizen and who is not? How do you keep track of changes in behaviour? What happens to bad citizens who become homeless if there are no homes left for them because they’ve been taken by all the good citizens?
But possibly the most difficult thing about Mr Field’s proposals is that the underlying premise that there are some people who deserve the support of the state, and some who do not. It all seems rather Victorian.
People aren’t born as good citizens or bad citizens. They behave in a certain way because of the influences, opportunities and upbringing they’ve had. ‘Neighbours from hell’, as the tabloids like to brand them, need to be supported by the housing sector, not excluded from it.
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From House work
Examining the latest news on allocations, evictions, rents, anti-social behaviour, and a host of other day to day housing management issues
Readers' comments (7)
F451 | 30/01/2012 3:56 pm
Neighbours from hell are manufactured by the tabloid mentality - it is easier to have a hate focus than accept that the government is failing to govern in the interest of the many.
There have always been extreme MPs, and Field is one in a long line. Sadly, they tend to have an influence far wider than their views dictate. Mosely is a prime example. The danger is that Field's views currently cut into the popularised propaganda of evil undeserving people causing the rest of us so much harm.
The Field's bad citizens are not featured in his thinking as to where they will be housed and how they may be maintained. Obviously these bad citizens will not be the loud and raucous bonus earning louts who near bankrupted the world economy - they can afford to look after themselves. No, bad citizens will be the dispossessed, the excluded, the low paid and the no paid. Later, bad citizens will need to include the next social step up, and so on, just so the ever smaller band of the deserving, the good citizens, can continue to believe that it pays to work.
The danger with the Fields' of this world is well meaning or not, they are likely to give rise to social segregation at best, and ghettoisation and death at worst.
If more of Field's ideas are taken up history may look back on the city of Liverpool with infamy.
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Omega 3 | 30/01/2012 4:40 pm
any chance of a premier league of well behaved MP's- would be a lot easier to monitor
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martin haddelsey | 31/01/2012 4:00 pm
I think anyone working or living in social housing would agree that 'neighbours from hell' ARE a reality, and not just an invention of the press. However, I agree F451 that Field's comments are mis-timed & play into the current scapegoating of the 'undeserving poor', which provides useful ideological cover at a time of severe cutbacks.
The new government guidelines on allocations (out for consultation) will allow local authorities to distinguish between applicants on the basis of their behaviour in any case - where Field goes beyond this is in suggesting that 'good citizens' should trump people in housing need, full stop. This would dismantle social housing as a pillar of the welfare state, and it would no longer be possible to call it 'social'. However, there may be significant numbers of people who could sustain tenancies in the private sector, so long as bond schemes are extended. Unfortunately, the welfare reforms will mitigate against the sustainability of private tenancies, leading to a 'revolving door' of homelessness.
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Alpha One | 31/01/2012 4:44 pm
Er, not quite F451, Neighbours from Hell are not manufactured by the tabloids, they're a really real problem that some have to live with.
Have you ever lived next to or near neighbours from hell, I'll tell you that is not demonisation by the tabloids that creates them, they do a very good job of creating themselves!
I lived down the road from a group of drug dealers, who used to give drugs to their Jack Russell, then let it loose on the street without a lead. It would chase anyone and anything and, despite it's small size, was quite scary. It got run over three times and lived. They would be out in the street drinking and swearing, and if you tried to challenge them you just got verbal abuse and usually dog mess outside your house.
I've also lived next door to people who played music to the early hours, had louds parties, a string of 'boyfriends', numerous cars and who treated their backgarden like a toilet. They lived in the property for 12 months. When they took the let it had been completed renovated, when they moved out the landlord had to completely renovate it again just to sell it, such was the mess and filth they had left.
These families don't need support, they need locking up away from civilised people until they are either rehabilitated or they die. That may sound extreme, but when you have a poison, you isolate it and prevent it from spreading, you don't give it a social home and benefits for life!
Go on, call me Hitler, Poll Pot or whatever, but only be isolating serious ASB and dealing with it with direct and sustained intervention until it is gone, can we rid ourselves of neighbours from hell.
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F451 | 31/01/2012 5:47 pm
No I won't do that Alpha - I will ask you to consider the nature to nurture debate in this context.
Do you honestly believe that such people are born that way, or is it that they are manufactured.
I can remember many years back being trained in customer service. I was told to expect aggression from African/Caribbean customers because I was white. It was explained to me that the expectation of many such customers of a white face was to be given a difficult time, to be treated with prejudice, and generally to be fobbed of, so the acquired behaviour was to get the response in first to the expected treatment.
The point is that when the customers got to know me as a helpful person willing to listen I was no longer pressumed a problem for most from the outset, and how I was percieved changed.
This was learned behaviours that had I not been trained to understand why they existed could have just reinforced my own prejudice and seen me responding in stereo type.
Now I accept that not all neighbours are as we would wish. I've lived with difficult neighbours and am probably at time a difficult neighbour too. Aren't we all at some time in some way.
How we choose to live together, what we tolerate, how we request tollerance, and when we opt for enforcement are all factors.
I have seen communities changed with empowerment - the learned behaviours can change.
Reinforce in people that there is no point making the effort. Lable them as trouble. Condemn them without option. Thats how you make neighbours from hell.
There will always be the minority who's will need different treatment, just as there is a majority who commit crime. But why pretend a problem is bigger than it really is just to sell papers and win votes - that is really anti social.
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steve king | 31/01/2012 7:10 pm
Congratulations Tom on your excellent understanding of this situation and the issues that arise. I see other readers are commenting on 'neighbours from hell ', which are often 'cultivated' over months and years by discriminatory and abusive treatment by those in authority, by frustration and shortages of money to live on, to the illegal drugs some of them take and the increases in the strengths of drugs they take, their alcoholism, in some cases leading to violent mental health conditions, them committing offences and behaving in a dangerous manner, and of course as they deteriorate so does the quality of life of those living around them. As for proper effective support services or 'treatment', that is virtually impossible to obtain, repeat addiction ad recurring problemsare the norm in over 80% of cases, and ive seen where certain 'professionals' do not want the hassle of dealing with the most serious cases, and just let them get on with it. The entire system is failing, not due to a lack of funds in all cases, but also due to the people employed to manage and deal with these situations not really having 100% commitment to their job, and dealing with the least number of cases ( often the easiest ) they can get away with, rather than as many as they can.
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Rosa Hooses | 01/02/2012 11:18 am
It's not my fault guv, it's the drugs wot made me do it, and I couldn't help taking them because of the way all those nasty people in authority treat me and my lack of money.
Give me a break.
"am probably at times a difficult neighbour too. Aren't we all at some time in some way". Yes, I occasionally leave my empty bins out for a day longer than I should. But it's a bit different from threats of violence, vandalism and constant late night noise disturbance.
Nature or nurture? It is a bit of both. But if you have neighbours from hell then you don't give a hoot what caused them to be the way they are, you just want them to be dealt with.
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