Tory mission impossible

Owning your own home is for many people their biggest aspiration. So why is the Tory party, who claim to be the party of aspiration, making it impossible for most people to ever realise this dream?

House prices hit a record high in November 2015 with the average cost of a home reaching ÂŁ288,000.

House prices are now 14 times the average salary and 600 families a day face losing their homes.

The government’s controversial housing and planning bill reaches the Lords today (26 January) which will phase out social housing altogether in favour of a new generation of ‘starter’ homes that will be unaffordable for people on low incomes.

Councils will be forced to sell off more than 100,000 homes to subsidise right-to-buy discounts for housing association tenants, with no guarantee of like-for-like replacements.

The programme will also not help the millions of vulnerable renters, desperate to buy a home but with no prospect of being able to.

The government further showed its true colours by voting down an amendment to their bill that would have meant private landlords had to make their homes fit for human habitation.

There are three million adult children living at home with their parents because they cannot afford to get a foot on the property ladder or even to rent.

Selling off social housing stock will also do nothing to alleviate the housing crisis Britain is facing.

“There is a housing crisis that is deepening in this country and yet the government refuses to take the simple action that could create decent homes and decent work, and give a massive boost to the economy,” said Steve Turner, Unite assistant general secretary.

“They have instead chosen to systematically erode what social housing stock we have left. The end of security of tenancy, refusing to support those in private rented homes and have instead sided with bad landlords. This is a political project being pursued at the expense of millions of people having a future secure and decent home they can afford,” he added.

According to the Office of National Statistics (ONS), house prices have increased on average 6.9 per cent a year since 1980. The reason – lack of housing stock meaning demand outweighs supply.

The problem is only going to get worse with an ever growing population. A decade ago, the Barker Review of Housing Supply said that 250,000 homes needed to be built every year to prevent spiralling house prices and a shortage of affordable homes.

A Daily Mirror investigation found a third of ex-council homes sold under Margaret Thatcher were now owned by private landlords.

In one London borough almost half of ex-council properties are now sub-let to tenants.

Unite is calling for a massive council house building scheme to create decent jobs, to build homes for social rent that people can afford to live in, and the regulation of private landlords with the emphasis on decent home standards and rent controls, which work in Germany and Sweden.