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Out walking on Saturday evening I was struck by this view. I only wish I could do it greater justice with a better photo. This is miles inside the M25 (London orbital motorway for those from outside the UK) looking in the direction of central London.
The tower blocks are part of the Le Courbusier inspired Alton Estate in Roehampton built in the late 50s as social housing. Some of those flats would have fabulous views over Richmond Park or towards central London. Can you imagine (in the country where a disaster like the Grenfell fire was possible) that any part of the public sector would build housing with views like that now? It wouldn't surprise me if, like much council housing in the UK, many of the units have long since been sold to tenants. Many found their way into the possession of investors who now rent them out to the grandchildren of old tenants, but at market rates. Such is progress. Given when they were built, the public debt has probably long since been paid off, so had they been kept in public ownership, even at below market rents, they could have been earning a surplus for the local authorities whilst serving a social purpose. Even as far back as the 70s, as council rents had gone up with inflation, the income from them must have dwarfed the amounts needed to service the debt. Instead public money is spent giving benefits to help working people pay the rent. So in a way it's gone full circle with 'subsidised rents' but with different beneficiaries of the tax-payers' largesse.
The house I now live in was also built as a council house in 1920 - part of the post Great War building of 'homes fit for heroes'. The last council tenants who bought the house some time in the 80s would have been of my parents' generation. That generation who were able to buy their council houses or flats (including my own parents) would have had a one-off capital boost having bought them at a good discount from the market value. Councils were not permitted to spend a penny of the capital receipts for the housing stock that they had no say in selling, so they could not replace social housing by building more. We now have the lowest proportion of owner-occupied dwellings for decades in this country. Many well paid young people cannot afford to buy, with properties selling for many multiples of average income. Ironically having a large, state-owned and operated housing stock meant that buying a house was much more affordable for middle income families. With low rents for decent quality housing, the private rented sector was not so lucrative, so privately owned houses and flats were not being snapped up by investors. Now people like us pay three times for the privilege - higher prices on the houses we buy to live in; higher tax to subsidise the market rents of those who can't afford them; and, indirectly, through the loss of financial surpluses on local authorities' housing stock.
Sorry, I went off track a bit there. It all started off with me noticing the juxtaposition of large mammals doing their thing in front of very urban looking housing.
Nice photo of the London wildlife. Is a council house the same as public housing?
ReplyDeleteYes it is Jonathan. Three very similar terms if not exactly the same are council housing (local authority owned, ie city level), public housing (almost synonymous, but could be any state owned housing), social housing (any housing provided to fulfil a social purpose- as well as the state could be owned by ‘third sector’ organisations, often ‘housing associations’ who now manage or even own housing previously owned by the state).
DeleteBy the 1970s something like 40 or 50% of housing was public housing. It wasn’t therefore limited to people on welfare. The street I grew up in was a small for example leafy ‘cul de sac’ (don’t know what American-English is for that) with respectable, house proud, working class tenants. Well with one exception a couple of doors down 🙄).
Great photo, thoughtful words.
ReplyDeleteThanks Alan. I try to look at it through the lens of what my own lot would have been had I been growing up now. I have benefitted hugely from the Welfare State, and I have no wish to see the drawbridge taken up - in fact it needs to be lowered again. I also like to think I’ve been a good investment by the Welfare State and I’m reminded of it when I complete my tax return 😉
DeleteSplendid photo - I love it. The subject of social housing (or whatever we are calling it this week) is not good for my blood pressure this time of the morning, but is interesting. I'll swerve the whole issue of monetarism and politics, and merely make my eternal bleating noise about how a hamster of average intellect could have seen in 1980 that one day the whole thing would become unsustainable - a nation filled with houses which hardly any of the owners would be able to afford to buy from themselves, in which we have had to invent a separate market for "affordable" housing, so that developers and financiers may continue to line their own pockets. I shall mention none of this, because my doctor has advised me against it.
ReplyDeleteI will say that there some odd examples around. In some strange way, Derek Hatton (of whom, in some areas, it is still recommended that one should speak no ill) produced some remarkable new housing in Liverpool in the 1980s - good quality, attractive, which changed the city a great deal - he was, of course, driven mostly by personal greed, and he had a great deal of ruined city to redevelop, but it seems to have worked. Maybe it was an accident? Just saying.
My other experience of community housing has been in Scotland. Apart from the great mistakes of the purpose-built ghettos of the Terror Towers in Glasgow, and the Banana Flats in Gorgie, there seems to have been a wish to remind people every day that they were in the Cooncil's property, so stand to attention and be grateful. When I first lived in Edinburgh, the culture shock of those grey barrack blocks at Pilton and Niddrie was quite something for an outsider. The houses were well enough built (for the most part), but, somewhere, some Presbyterian local authority architect was given the task of reminding the tenants, every day, that they were lucky to have a house at all, so shut up. These places were grim - they were built to be grim.
Ah yes, a favourite joke of my old O-level History teacher was “after the Great War the cry was ‘homes fit for heroes’. And only heroes could live in them”. 😄
DeleteMy own experience was hugely different. The estate I grew up on was really a model post WWII development. Mostly 3 bedroom semis and linked houses (short terrace) with big gardens, brick built out houses, a few maisonettes, and a two storey row of old people’s flats. The brickwork gave it away as ‘council’ but other than that Calvinism was well out of sight. The development came complete with small shopping ‘squares’, playing fields and ‘recs’, well-maintained and green public realm, a pub and even a church and not overly large so your social life wasn’t bounded by the estate. Having said that, my parents had to have a character reference to get a house in the first place and people who fell foul of the rules too often might find themselves relocated to Immingham.
Nice photo! Yes as a social experiment it has clearly failed as the market hasn't looked after those on lower income and it has impacted on the rest of society, who knew?! Let's not start on college fees next, can't take it!
ReplyDeleteBest Iain
Cheers Iain. It might not have been a problem if councils had been allowed to invest the capital receipts in new stock. College fees: point taken.
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