Here are the facts, as reported by The Guardian based on this research by housing charity Shelter:
More than one million children in England now live in overcrowded homes, a rise of 54,000 in the last two years, a charity warned today. New figures released by Shelter highlight the record number of under-15-year-olds living in cramped conditions, with one in 10 children in overcrowded housing.
The figures, calculated from the government’s annual Survey of English Housing, reveal the problem is particularly acute in London and among those living in social housing. One in five (331,000) children in London and one fifth (520,000) of those in social rented housing live in cramped conditions, while social housing in London is worst hit. More than a third of children (234,000) living in social housing in the capital are in either overcrowded or seriously overcrowded homes.
Under the law, overcrowding is defined as two people of the opposite sex sleeping in the same room, unless they are a couple or at least one of them is under 10 years old.
Lib Dem shadow housing minister Sarah Teather gives her reaction to the report in The Guardian:
We have a chronic lack of family-sized social housing and unless the government addresses this shortage, many more children will be condemned to life in crowded housing. We need a massive increase in the number of social homes to stop more families suffering the misery of overcrowded and unsuitable housing.”
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8 Comments
No – we need LVT.
A million empty properties would start returning to residential use, with rents falling as a result – making homes more affordable all round, permanently and immediately.
The problem is that the current statutory defined `overcrowded standard’ has not be updated by this Government or any previous one, since 1935.
The current archaic housing law on `overcrowded standard’ still remains that there is deemed to be overcrowding in any house or flat wherever there are so many people that any two or more persons,being ten or more years old,and of opposite sexes,not being persons living together as husband and wife,have to sleep in the same room.This definition is outmoded and practically useless, as a way of assessing real spatial family housing needs, in 2009.
The Housing Act 1935 was mainly aimed at the private rented sector and it was envisaged to prosecute any LA that permitted homes to be occupied in violation of the `overcrowded standard’.The Attorney General has never allowed this to happen.
I however,ask the discerning eye, to consider the quality of life being lived for all those known families i.e. I million children,that are subjected to the 75 year antiquated `overcrowded standard’ rule still being enforced today.
If this Government delays as it has done over 12 years,the results of the Population Census in 2011 will challenge the new Government to the onerous task of reforming the `overcrowded standard’ law in the light of the new revealed social data, as it will starkly reveal by how much overcrowded social housing and private rented sector accommodation there is in Britain.
I suggest that there is a duty of care to children, especially to ensure that there is new social housing built at a faster rate then there has been to date, with a greater percentage of 3/4 bed homes,with environmental considerations that must also be enforced, to make new homes family friendly and with access to gardens and play space and local accessible pre-school places.
The task is a gargantuan one but we must start by passing housing law that updates the `overcrowded standard’ to become consistent with the needs of families in the 21st C.
An end to poverty through lack of a progressive housing policy should be seen to be dominant in our Election Campaign in 2010?.
How does this fits with our plans to cut public expenditure?
Surely the cost of building would be covered by the rents ?
What about buying up all of these developments in city centres, all of these flats and the like that litter cities like Manchester, Newcastle and Sheffield, and using them for social housing ?
@ Andrew Duffield, why wouldn’t LVT just lead to the rent of existing rental properties rising as landlords pass off the increased cost on them (like they do with council tax)?
@Simon – just the question I was going to ask.
We cannot go into a general election with the agenda outlined in “A Fresh Start” when our spokespeople continually demand more spending left, right and centre.
@Meandyew – possibly but in the long term – but you’d need the capital now.
@ Grammar Police – LVT lowers rents (and sale prices) by bringing more properties onto the market. Market forces also ensure that the tax cannot be passed on, as virtually all economists agree. LVT is completely unavoidable and MUST be paid by the landlord. Since landlords already extract the maximum possible from their tenants, they cannot pass this cost on. Providing housing should not be a function of local government any more than providing food is. All government needs to do is collect unearned economic rent and redistribute it equitably.
“Since landlords already extract the maximum possible from their tenants, they cannot pass this cost on.”
Hmmm…. Wanna bet? 🙂
My landlord didn’t cut the rent when the poll tax came in. They did put it up when Council Tax came in (different people admitedly but I’ll bet all the money in my pockets at the moment that it didn’t go down!)
Given the shortage of rented property in many areas relying on market forces to keep rents down seems a little optimistic even for the much vaunted superpowers of LVT :-).