Housing

What is the situation?

Through policies such as ‘Right to Buy’, social housing provision is at a record low and where it does exist is often now part or fully-privatised, leading to a massive drop in standards.

At the same time, we see a rise in repossessions and eviction, a problem which has been made worse by the recent recession.

This has contributed to the growth of the private landlords, many of whom are overcharging for inadequate properties and are operating with little regulation.

All of this has led to a very real drop in the quality of life for working class people. They are either spending most of their wages on poor quality housing in the private sector, or they are living in sink-estates as the Councils let the estates get worse so that people will want to move away from them, thus removing them from the Council Housing lists and reducing the Council’s bills and responsibilities.

The result of this is that virtually everyone is a tenant now. Mortgage holders are tenants of the mortgage holder (usually a bank), and as we have seen recently these institutions are far from safe. Others are tenants of the Council (in Council Housing), housing associations or private landlords.

We are increasingly being pushed into private tenancy. This is bad. When the landlord is the Council, it allows for at least a limited amount of accountability. Furthermore, where there are similar conditions and the same landlord, there is the possibility of collective bargaining. Applying pressure to a private landlord in a similar way is much harder.

What do we want?

In the short term, we want to see an increase in the State provision in social housing. This will include bringing empty property back into service and the building of quality new Council Housing.

However we also recognise that prevailing social attitudes in the UK value 'ownership' through a mortgage over renting, and see Community Land Trusts as a way of bridging this gap.

This increase in State provided social housing will be coupled with the increased provision of social housing by other sources, be they community buy-outs, housing co-ops, etc.

We recognise that Community Land Trusts, community buy-outs and (in Scotland) common good land are concrete capital gains for the working class over the state and capital. At the same time, state guarantees are needed to insulate such institutions from market forces.

Any and all empty properties should be brought back into circulation to deal with the backlog in the waiting lists for Council Housing. Any properties that are currently uninhabitable should be either rendered inhabitable or should be demolished and new social housing should be built on the site.

All this will be pushed by mass organisations of tenants. Over time, these tenant organisations will be in a position to take control of housing from the Councils. Our long term aim is for popular control of our housing.

How will we do it?

Endorse the calls from Defend Council Housing (DCH) and Unite

Individual members involved in the Community section of L&S Strategy (and especially those active in housing struggles) should assess the benefits of getting involved in local chapters of DCH or Scotland’s For Council Housing.

Get involved in Residents and Tenant’s Association’s to push them towards action and initiatives in this direction.