Oooh, look. Half a million more people claiming housing benefit under coalition.

[TheDaddy]

Originally Posted by Ramrod

........and? So what? Are you honestly suggesting that people on benefits should expect to live in the same quality housing (ie. location/build quality/same quality mod cons) as someone who is self funding and actually paying their way? Where is the incentive to work harder/get training etc & how is that fair on people who earn a 'decent' wage?
(Excluding the disabled, who we should bend over backwards for)
Oh please.

---------- Post added at 20:39 ---------- Previous post was at 20:27 ----------


Needed saying

---------- Post added at 20:48 ---------- Previous post was at 20:39 ----------

Thats not being ignored, we all acknowledge that more houses need to be built, price bubbles aren't good etc...but the fact (that you ignored in my post) remains: Private rents are very closely alligned to the other rents being charged in an area which in turn are spookily closely aligned to house prices, mortgage rates, tax rates etc. It's almost as if rents are dictated by external financial forces, not simply landlords whims

---------- Post added at 20:50 ---------- Previous post was at 20:48 ----------

Much like your post

Lol what can anyone here do about it? It's being ignored by everyone who can do something about it

[Ramrod]

Originally Posted by TheDaddy

Lol what can anyone here do about it?

What can be done is that our left wing bretheren can start to realise that rents aren't being set by (evil) landlords, just market forces
Then we can all begin to address the causes of the problem rather than just watch socialists engage in erronious rabble rousing

[TheDaddy]

Originally Posted by Ramrod

What can be done is that our left wing bretheren can start to realise that rents aren't being set by (evil) landlords, just market forces
Then we can all begin to address the causes of the problem rather than just watch socialists engage in erronious rabble rousing

But they're not set by the market because the market is being manipulated if it was genuinely being set by the market we'd see houses being built to satisfy the demand

[Ramrod]

Originally Posted by TheDaddy

But they're not set by the market because the market is being manipulated if it was genuinely being set by the market we'd see houses being built to satisfy the demand

You are seeing a conspiracy where there is simply ineptitude.

[heero_yuy]

Originally Posted by TheDaddy

But they're not set by the market because the market is being manipulated if it was genuinely being set by the market we'd see houses being built to satisfy the demand

You seem to be forgetting things like planning permission, lack of finance, lack of skilled trades persons, lack of raw materials, inertia, NIMBYism etc. There are any number of reasons that house building doesn't go ballistic.

Perhaps the most unmentionable is just like the argument against new roads: cars will come to drive on them. Build more houses and people will flock from everywhere to fill them.

What we really need to do is to use the existing stock more efficiently. Time was when several generations lived in a single small property. Now we have singles living in multibedroomed properties. Something the so called "bedroom tax" was bought in to try and solve.

Of course if we had a fully Soviet Stallinist government and all housing was owned by the state then people would be forced to move to properties deemed sufficient for their needs and also forced to share with others if there were spare bedrooms. Problem solved.

[Osem]

Originally Posted by heero_yuy

You seem to be forgetting things like planning permission, lack of finance, lack of skilled trades persons, lack of raw materials, inertia, NIMBYism etc. There are any number of reasons that house building doesn't go ballistic.

Perhaps the most unmentionable is just like the argument against new roads: cars will come to drive on them. Build more houses and people will flock from everywhere to fill them.
What we really need to do is to use the existing stock more efficiently. Time was when several generations lived in a single small property. Now we have singles living in multibedroomed properties. Something the so called "bedroom tax" was bought in to try and solve.

Of course if we had a fully Soviet Stallinist government and all housing was owned by the state then people would be forced to move to properties deemed sufficient for their needs and also forced to share with others if there were spare bedrooms. Problem solved.

Too true. So far as I can see, aside from making better use of what we have, the most logical way to tackle this problem (and many others) is to build more homes of the type really needed but control population growth, especially that due to mass immigration which brings with it sudden and large scale demands for homes, services, infrastructure etc. The alternative is for more of the UK to be built upon with all of the irreversible detrimental effects that will have on our way of life and environment.

[Taf]

Originally Posted by martyh

You keep banging on about rent inflation but do you realise that private sector rents only went up by 1% in England last year,1.4% in Scotland and only 0.2 in Wales .

Council rent here has just risen by 3.8%

He was referring to Private Sector rents, not your local Labour Council.....

[Pierre]

Originally Posted by Damien

The Tories/Liberal Democrats have been in office 5 years now. Time is running out on giving them a free pass because of problems that started under Labour.

Get bent, how often to people still come out with " it's all Thatchers fault". 25 years after she's gone.

Originally Posted by Pierre

Get bent, how often to people still come out with " it's all Thatchers fault". 25 years after she's gone.

So? First of all I don't do that so I don't see why I should 'get bent'. Secondly they're also wrong or at least misguided since anything that was Thatcher's fault was subsequently had time to be rectified.

That defence is nothing more than the "But Mum! They do it too!". Two wrongs don't make a right and, contrary to belief on here, there is not a 'red' team and a 'blue' team who are reasonable for everyone else that they vaguely share a spectrum with.

People have to come up with a better defence than trying to find someone else who has also done it. It's meritless.

[Ramrod]

Originally Posted by Damien

So? First of all I don't do that so I don't see why I should 'get bent'.

Probably 'cos you came out with such a stupid comment.
As has already been said here. The Tories inherited a total clusterf*ck left by the last lot on top of a financial depression. 5 years isn't long enough to undo all that. Especially in a coilition with the other bunch of numpties.

[TheDaddy]

Originally Posted by heero_yuy

You seem to be forgetting things like planning permission, lack of finance, lack of skilled trades persons, lack of raw materials, inertia, NIMBYism etc. There are any number of reasons that house building doesn't go ballistic.

Perhaps the most unmentionable is just like the argument against new roads: cars will come to drive on them. Build more houses and people will flock from everywhere to fill them.

What we really need to do is to use the existing stock more efficiently. Time was when several generations lived in a single small property. Now we have singles living in multibedroomed properties. Something the so called "bedroom tax" was bought in to try and solve.

Of course if we had a fully Soviet Stallinist government and all housing was owned by the state then people would be forced to move to properties deemed sufficient for their needs and also forced to share with others if there were spare bedrooms. Problem solved.

I forgot nothing even in spite of a couple of the things on your list being erroneous, two of the biggest hurdles to house building aren't even on your list, house builders having gotten used to making 20% on the cost of a house and councils like Kensington and westminster not only not enforcing house builders legal obligation to provide a certain amount of social housing according to the numbers of houses they build but they've actively encouraged them not to build any.

[Ramrod]

Originally Posted by TheDaddy

house builders having gotten used to making 20% on the cost of a house

What's wrong with that?

and councils like Kensington and westminster not only not enforcing house builders legal obligation to provide a certain amount of social housing according to the numbers of houses they build but they've actively encouraged them not to build any.

lol, social housing alongside 'normal' new builds........if the experience in Woolwich is anything to go by, that approach simply provides a certion sub section of society with easy access to cars and houses that can be broken into.

Originally Posted by Ramrod

What's wrong with that?lol, social housing alongside 'normal' new builds........if the experience in Woolwich is anything to go by, that approach simply provides a certion sub section of society with easy access to cars and houses that can be broken into.

Actually it works well and has done for years, because ,shock horror ,not everyone in social housing is an anti social scrote ,the same as everyone in private housing isn't a drug dealer.The idea that a section of society should be removed from another section of society and housed in different areas is as antiquated as it is pompous

[Ramrod]

Originally Posted by martyh

Actually it works well and has done for years, because ,shock horror ,not everyone in social housing is an anti social scrote ,the same as everyone in private housing isn't a drug dealer.The idea that a section of society should be removed from another section of society and housed in different areas is as antiquated as it is pompous

Never said that it is always the case. Simply pointing out that it sometimes doesn't work and that council/govt led brute force social engineering possibly isn't the best way forward.
....and are you saying that this approach doesn't provide a certain sub section of society with easy access to cars and houses that can be broken into?