Welfare week articles on Guardian housing network

The Guardian’s online housing network has run a series of articles this week on housing provision and welfare reforms, covering a wide range of issues. Worth having a look.

Why are older people exempted from the impact of welfare reform?

So why is it that older people have been shielded from most of the impact of welfare reform? They will not suffer the bedroom tax – a reduction in benefits for under-occupation of social housing, yet they commonly underoccupy property in all sectors, overconsuming assets, putting pressure on rent and house prices and often living lonely and impoverished lives.

Housing benefit: ‘Homes will have to be handed to the private sector’

At Notting Hill we are preparing for 700 households to be affected by the cap when it comes into force next year. This means we face ending 700 of our tenancies and removing households from their communities. We will work with local authorities to try to provide cheaper alternatives but it is a tall order for providers, and a huge issue for the families concerned.

Editor’s blog: five unanswered questions about welfare reform

The core problem with the proposed reform of the welfare system is that it fails to handle some of the biggest problems our benefits system faces by pushing them under the rug only to pop up elsewhere – and at a greater cost – later on.

There is no doubt that too much public money is spent on subsidising housing through housing benefit, but the answer to this is not to cut off subsidy at the source leaving tenants to meet an unaffordable gap in an inclement economic climate when jobs are rare and skills training out of reach for the many.

Should social landlords pass on the bedroom tax to tenants?

The principle of reducing rents may seem like an anathema – but so did developing without grant funding, publishing all expenditure over £500 and private sector landlords reducing rents in exchange for direct payment. Underoccupation charges across social housing could prove a social and economic black hole or a new dawn. Evaluating the social and economic consequences of passing on the bedroom tax is a rational response to an absurd “big bang” policy change.

Localising the social fund: moving too fast?

There are unanswered questions for councils: will welfare reform increase local demand for crisis support; could differing rules between neighbouring authorities lead to population migration; and should these local schemes make loan repayment a condition of future assistance?

Universal credit doesn’t help tenants off benefits and into work

The economist John Maynard Keynes perhaps captured this spirit with his famous observation: “I would rather be vaguely right than precisely wrong”. Extended payments are well understood, well regarded and effective, providing benefit claimants with a straightforward work incentive. The government’s proposed regulations for universal credit would remove this well regarded system. They seem also to contradict universal credit’s aim to provide people with incentives to move into work.

Lord Freud: ‘We must allow people to run their lives independently’

The new universal credit system will support people back into work and take away the risk of starting employment by ensuring that people know that they are better off in work. It will also help people to feel more in control as they will have a clearer understanding of what is expected of them and what they will receive in return. Having a clear benefits system will have a remarkable impact on the social life and health of the country.

More articles here, Welfare week from the housing network