End Of Year Review 2015: Housing

The housing sector faced uncertainty in 2015 as George Osborne announced new rules on social rents and a Right to Buy policy for housing association tenants. But there was growth in student housing co-ops and the sector expanded in Wales – and, on an international level, the movement came together to help Haiti’s earthquake victims. For housing co-operatives in the UK the year was a challenging one, with co-operative housing organisations worrying that the Right to Buy provisions for housing association tenants could affect community-led housing initiatives.  Read the rest of the round up for the year on the Co-operative News website.

The Housing Review of the Year

As another action-packed and controversial year for housing draws to a close, Jules Birch looks back on the high, but mainly low, points of 2014. Here’s a few selected high/lowlights;

JANUARY - Fergus Wilson, the king of buy to let, gets into the Christmas spirit by sending eviction notices to his tenants on housing benefit.

MARCH - Single mothers in temporary accommodation in Oxford are offered new homes in Birmingham and Cardiff as the impact of the benefit cap is felt outside London.

APRIL - Lib Dem president Tim Farron says the party will “withdraw support” from the bedroom tax. A blind woman from Lincolnshire is evicted from her home of 30 years over £210 of arrears and ends up sleeping rough in a field.

JULY - By happy coincidence, the DWP chooses the day of the Cabinet reshuffle to publish the much-delayed independent interim evaluation of ‘the removal of the spare room subsidy’. Among the findings: 57% of bedroom tax victims have cut back on household essentials; a third borrowed money to pay the shortfall; and 4.5% had managed to downsize. Read more on 24housing.