time limited public sector tenancies

I have just read the news that the government plans to give new public sector tenants tenancies which last only two years, after which they can be reviewed and if the tenant has become too well off they can be evicted to make way for somebody else on the waiting list. Has anybody read any details about how they propose to bring this about? I imagine the public sector landlords would have to pry into their tenants finances and capital to find out if they have become ‘too well off’ to need public housing. How do they think they are going to get the right, or the means, to be able to implement this, and within 6 months, apparently?

Nobody told them that social housing isn’t actually means tested at present!

This was diuscussed in the thread “the end of secure tenancies”, I think was in other areas of law, the government is making a detailed announcemnet today. Clearly another significant piece of the Coalitions jigsaw.

Thinks to look for are : How will this fit with transfers and decants.
                            How will this fit with Right to Buy
                            How will La meet their obligations to the Homeless
                            How will this be implemented.

plans are expected to be published today:
http://www.insidehousing.co.uk/news/housing-management/lifetime-tenancies-to-be-axed/6512604.article

If its anything like the Welfare Reform white paper, expect it to be very light on detail.

Here is the document

http://www.communities.gov.uk/documents/housing/pdf/1775577.pdf

Exec Summary

http://www.communities.gov.uk/documents/housing/pdf/1775586.pdf

There are a couple of proposals that have not been widely trailed.

Proposal to ammend the homeless legislation so that a duty can be discharged into private sector

Proposal to end open waiting lists, so for example LA could close list to anyone not in their area 1 year.

And here we are, back with two favourite themes of Tory housing policy, security of tenure and rent control.  You can often gauge the moral compass of a government by its housing policy.  The second Labour government of 1975 was a high watershed moment in housing policy with the 1977 Rent Act and Protection from Eviction Act, making, for the first time, unlawful eviction an indictable offence.

Subsequent Tory administrations have systematically rolled back the protection afforded by the Rent Act (no government would dare to meddle with the basic provisions of the Protection from Eviction Act) in the dogmatic belief that the shift toward tenants rights had gone too far and that power had to be shifted back to landlords in order for more affordable accommodation to become available.

This myth conveniently ignored the fact that the Tory’s had forbidden local authorities from allowing the revenue raised under right to buy to be ploughed back into more house building thus artificially distorting the housing market to suit ideology.  New Labour did nothing to reverse this either, merely tinkering around the edges concentrating on things like tenants’ anti-social behaviour (important no doubt to those affected by it but hardly the heart of a properly considered housing policy) and clearing brown field sites for homes to buy for first time buyers.  A golden opportunity wasted by a venal government hypnotised by the Medusa like stare of the private sector.

And so this is where we are today.  A Tory government (what coalition – please!) that has once again been able, this time by Labour inaction (unlike in 1979 when it faced much tougher opposition), to highjack the debate in order to re-introduce its two favourite themes knowing that any opposition from the Party opposite is doomed to charges of too little and too late.  Ed Miliband has his work cut out.  He needs to cut the New Labour cancer right out of his Party and re-examine fundamental questions concerning the balance of class forces in this country.  But, I’m not holding my breath and, as for 1977, I fear we shall never see its like again.

Hear, Hear, Nevip. Beautifully put if I may say so.

It seems that Chartered Institute of Housing has come broadly out in favour.  http://www.cih.org/policy/CIHBriefing-Housing-ReformNov10.pdf

I’d have resigned had I still been a member.

Where is the incentive to return to work now?

Don Curtis - 25 November 2010 05:25 PM

I’d have resigned had I still been a member.

I think that many housing professionals will agree. The irony in all this is that the CIH has come out against HB changes. They dont seem to realise that this is all part of the same project, to equalise rent and tenures, across private and social sectors, with a view to creating a “free” level market, with less subsidy from cenral government to both providers and tenants. Very strange.

THe Localism Bill has now cleared the Commons. A Labour ammendment to do away with the bit that gives LAs the disretion to offer a time limited social tenancy was defeated. http://www.24dash.com/news/housing/2011-05-18-Localism-Bill-clears-Commons-despite-anger-over-social-housing-reforms......  Is this the beginning of the end for the life long tenancy?

And for anyone who did not see dispatches on channel 4 last night then Rachman, it appears, is still with us.