rosadell

• Comment on: Landlords: ‘We will kick convicted rioters out ’

  rosadell's comment | 25/08/2011 1:35 am

  @The Oracle - if members of the grown-up, long-established criminal gangs who run London's protection rackets, drugs businesses, and etc, get caught after smashing up a shop or bar and beating up the owner who did not pay his protection money to them, that criminal gang member is dealt with by the criminal justice system. They are not evicted from their home, privately owned or rented or social housing, and nor is their family. Very many of the recent looters were simply susceptible to that very part of human nature that politicians rely on when trying to get elected or to gull the population into supporting some dotty police change that will not benefit them at all - a kind of crowd fever that makes people fall-in with whatever a group of others are saying or doing. It is very effective. Others incited the riots or incited others to join in, or were much more violent and destructive. Most of these, I would suggest, are frustrated, without hope for any kind of decent future off the dole, with self-esteem that is increasingly sinking lower and lower. There is little provision for them in our society, nothing much for them to do all summer, youth clubs are very part time and being closed down, leisure centres unaffordable even at concessionary rates, there is no challenge for them to prove themselves against. They are teenagers, needing to find a place in society and their community of friends, to feel that they have some kind of status. Then add the testosterone of youth, the energy needing an outlet. The solution is not extra revenge, but use of the criminal justice system plus whatever it takes to mend the broken education system, to provide channels for the frustration and rage, to find ways to build self-esteem for them as valuable members of society, training, jobs. Where necessary the intensive intervention programmes that proved so successful should be reinstated. This will cost money, and much of that money would probably have to come from taxing the rich a tad more, ditching expensive nonsense projects such as Trident, and so-on. But our society has been broken by the very well-off and large and powerful corporate interests who do not see any reason to pay contributions towards improving the well-being and life chances of the poorest in society. Social cohesion just ain't their thing, and as far as they are concerned the devil can take the hindmost. Of course only some disadvantaged young people went rioting and looting or initiated it. Everyone's situation is different, everyone's genetic make-up and how they react to the environment is different. This does not mean that they should be completely abandoned by the rest of society. Anyway, do you really want them all sleeping rough, thieving even more when they could be learning to turn their lives around? The criminal justice system should deal with them appropriately according to their crimes, and unless looting and rioting was carried out on the estate they lived, as part of an ongoing ASB problem, they and their families should not be evicted. You get the society you pay for, and if the 'haves' are not willing to get by with a bit less (sell a boat or two or a property perhaps) then the numbers of the dispossessed will increase, and they will break out of their ghettos more often.

• Comment on: Landlords: ‘We will kick convicted rioters out ’

  rosadell's comment | 25/08/2011 1:35 am

  @The Oracle - if members of the grown-up, long-established criminal gangs who run London's protection rackets, drugs businesses, and etc, get caught after smashing up a shop or bar and beating up the owner who did not pay his protection money to them, that criminal gang member is dealt with by the criminal justice system. They are not evicted from their home, privately owned or rented or social housing, and nor is their family. Very many of the recent looters were simply susceptible to that very part of human nature that politicians rely on when trying to get elected or to gull the population into supporting some dotty police change that will not benefit them at all - a kind of crowd fever that makes people fall-in with whatever a group of others are saying or doing. It is very effective. Others incited the riots or incited others to join in, or were much more violent and destructive. Most of these, I would suggest, are frustrated, without hope for any kind of decent future off the dole, with self-esteem that is increasingly sinking lower and lower. There is little provision for them in our society, nothing much for them to do all summer, youth clubs are very part time and being closed down, leisure centres unaffordable even at concessionary rates, there is no challenge for them to prove themselves against. They are teenagers, needing to find a place in society and their community of friends, to feel that they have some kind of status. Then add the testosterone of youth, the energy needing an outlet. The solution is not extra revenge, but use of the criminal justice system plus whatever it takes to mend the broken education system, to provide channels for the frustration and rage, to find ways to build self-esteem for them as valuable members of society, training, jobs. Where necessary the intensive intervention programmes that proved so successful should be reinstated. This will cost money, and much of that money would probably have to come from taxing the rich a tad more, ditching expensive nonsense projects such as Trident, and so-on. But our society has been broken by the very well-off and large and powerful corporate interests who do not see any reason to pay contributions towards improving the well-being and life chances of the poorest in society. Social cohesion just ain't their thing, and as far as they are concerned the devil can take the hindmost. Of course only some disadvantaged young people went rioting and looting or initiated it. Everyone's situation is different, everyone's genetic make-up and how they react to the environment is different. This does not mean that they should be completely abandoned by the rest of society. Anyway, do you really want them all sleeping rough, thieving even more when they could be learning to turn their lives around? The criminal justice system should deal with them appropriately according to their crimes, and unless looting and rioting was carried out on the estate they lived, as part of an ongoing ASB problem, they and their families should not be evicted. You get the society you pay for, and if the 'haves' are not willing to get by with a bit less (sell a boat or two or a property perhaps) then the numbers of the dispossessed will increase, and they will break out of their ghettos more often.

• Comment on: Clegg backs moves to cut benefits for rioters

  rosadell's comment | 23/08/2011 11:23 pm

  The rioters have committed the cardinal sin of drawing the nation's attention to the outcome of years of policies that increase the wealth of the rich at the expense of the life chances and incomes of the poor. Clegg is just experiencing the same visceral reaction as the rest of the rich oligarchy that currently governs the country on behalf of the 'haves'. They want revenge - the disadvantaged are supposed to stay quiet in their ghettos, and as they have not they must be scapegoated, given the most damaging and destructive punishment, be turned into the dispossessed. They will be joining those homeless asylum seekers who sleep in waste bins and under fly-overs, taking up thieving and begging. In the bad old past of course they could have been exported to a penal colony or hung, so see how much better society is today?

• Comment on: Clegg backs moves to cut benefits for rioters

  rosadell's comment | 23/08/2011 11:23 pm

  The rioters have committed the cardinal sin of drawing the nation's attention to the outcome of years of policies that increase the wealth of the rich at the expense of the life chances and incomes of the poor. Clegg is just experiencing the same visceral reaction as the rest of the rich oligarchy that currently governs the country on behalf of the 'haves'. They want revenge - the disadvantaged are supposed to stay quiet in their ghettos, and as they have not they must be scapegoated, given the most damaging and destructive punishment, be turned into the dispossessed. They will be joining those homeless asylum seekers who sleep in waste bins and under fly-overs, taking up thieving and begging. In the bad old past of course they could have been exported to a penal colony or hung, so see how much better society is today?

• Comment on: Housing sector launches inquiry into English riots

  rosadell's comment | 23/08/2011 5:55 pm

  Why on earth the housing sector? If the 'radical solutions' are to include youth clubs and help with skills and finding jobs, then this should be funded by government not the social housing sector. They should up the tax a tad more for the wealthy and large businesses to cover the costs. Or does Grainia Long have in mind solutions such as violation of people's human right to a home (which is non-negotiable, not a privilege for the grossly underpaid and unemployed)?

rosadell has not added any discussions yet.

• Posted in: Should affordable housing be affordable?

  rosadell's post | 26/08/2011 0:39 am

  I think it is only a minority of people on benefits who would rather be poor and free, and it is not a lifestyle choice for most. When I earned enough to pay tax I was happy to support the welfare system, regardless of the relatively small number of deliberate 'freeloaders'. It is not that easy a life, and gets harder over time. Most people I have known who felt it better to be on benefits than work long hours in a dead-end job without career or pay rise prospects have eventually found it intolerable and gone into training, more education or found a job with some future. The problem is the sub-culture that has developed where several generations have been out of work, and the cycle of unemployability, rock-bottom self-esteem, people who have learned from the rest of society as well that they have no value and nothing to contribute.  Intensive intervention is needed to change this.

• Posted in: Terrible service from housing assoc

  rosadell's post | 25/08/2011 0:24 am

  Dealing with tenants who have repeatedly missed gas safety check appointments must be just as annoying as spending endless hours and a lot of money on repeatedly phoning the social housing landlord over a year just trying to get one repair done. Or as annoying as waiting in for a gas safety check or a repair visit, only to have the contractor neither turn up nor phone to let you know they cannot come, and then lie about it, for the third time running.

• Posted in: Should affordable housing be affordable?

  rosadell's post | 25/08/2011 0:18 am

  This may appear twice as I am having problems submitting - apologies.

  I am puzzled by that average HB payment of £79 per week - this seems low. I don't know how meaningful this is in reality as there is a lot of variation across the country.  Perhaps to afford social housing on a minimum wage people will have to up sticks and head for the cheapest parts of the country. Where there is probably even less work available.

  I have seen rents at this level on homeswap sites and marvelled at how low they are.  Where I live, a one bed flat was being let to a new tenant (assured tenancy) at £128 per week, but existing tenants were not paying as much.  As a comparison, two one bed flats are being let at market rent (not affordable), at £350 per week. A private and more upmarket flat in the vicinity So the maximum affordable rent on this social housing estate would be £280 per week (one bed). These are city centre rents though.

  Social rents have been on an escalating riser, according to a formula partly related to 'local area' (eg borough) market rent for an equivalent property. Most must have nearly reached the target rent though. This means that if the rents were lower than most, the rent rises have been quite a shock, and as they include a percentage in the formula, they seem to become a greater shock each year - more than £5 per week.

  So an affordable rent in my area is only affordable if you are quite well-off, and if you are on minimum wage or a low pension as some of the tenants must be, even the social rent can be hard to find from earnings.  Moving to somewhere cheaper is not that easy, though the landlord has offered to help people in rent areas to move to sink estates in places such as Liverpool and Hull. Far from their families, jobs, support networks, children's schools and friends. To move to the cheaper outskirts of the city means much higher fares - this can be quite a trap, with housing costs in the centre being the same as housing plus fares after a move to the outskirts of the city.

  Good luck Formerly Homeless - I found working so very expensive not least because I could no longer spend half of each day trekking from one shop to another down a long high road, getting the cheap offer in each one.  Will you try to find ways of improving your earning power?

• Posted in: Should affordable housing be affordable?

  rosadell's post | 23/08/2011 10:52 pm

  Actually going by Chris's estimation, which sounds very fair and reasonable to me, where I live an affordable rent for someone on the minimum wage would be just a little less than the social housing rent.  But then the minimum wage is not enough to live on where I live in London.