Housing crisis will get worse

It’s not demolishing council estates but focusing on social housing and dealing with inequality that has a chance at saving the housing crisis.

This week, Southwark and Lambeth came in the top three councils for housing complaints in a report by the Housing Ombudsman.

Statistics show one in 50 Londoners are in temporary accommodation, and Southwark is leading the way with 3,500 families.

Boroughs are estimated to be collectively spending £60million each month on accommodation costs.

Thousands of homes will be lost by the demolition of estates across South London.

The regeneration of the Aylesbury Estate in Walworth has seen social homes demolished and replaced with private or affordable rent units, displacing hundreds of tenants across the country.

The funding model leans towards private sector involvement, which means reducing the amount of social housing on the rebuilt estates.

Estates have a historic role in housing working class people.

Regeneration projects are also far from sustainable.

Construction, along with the energy required to heat, cool and power buildings, was estimated to account for almost 40 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions last year.

If estates marked for demolition were improved instead, a new path for construction that benefits people and planet could be made.

This month a cross-party committee ruled it unlikely that the Government would meet its pledge of building 300,000 homes a year.

Despite council estates’ desperate need for attention, Rishi Sunak responded with a new priority for housing – not to “concrete over the countryside”.

He said his reforms will regenerate unused land and help homeowners to renovate and extend their houses outwards and upwards.

As long as the Government sees social housing as a residual problem rather than an integral part of infrastructure policy, the housing crisis will only get worse.

SPIRIT OF SOUTH LONDON
South London Press

 

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