From 1974 until 1978 I was the Vicar of St John the Baptist, Little Hulton, Salford, Greater Manchester.
Little Hulton was once famously characterised by one of its famous Sons, Sean Ryder of the Happy Mondays, (the actor Christopher Eccleston is another famous son along with Paul Ryder), as a place better escaped from.
Together with the neighbouring parish of St Pauls, Peel and parts of the nearby town of Walkden nearly 60,000 people lived on a vast council estate.
In the mid seventies Salford local authority was busy demolishing the inner city slum dwellings and employed a housing nominations policy which favoured those whose houses were being cleared.
The consequence of this policy was that young people in Little Hulton were not offered housing on the estate near their families and in their own communities and instead when they married moved off the estate often into private, mortgaged properties in the towns that ringed Little Hulton and ran along the East Lancashire Road towards Liverpool, and in the process affecting the communities sustainability.
With Right to Buy, Margaret Thatcher's iconic housing initiative, property in Little Hulton was sold to existing tenants at massive discounts and it was soon possible to recognise the privatised properties as they sported, porches and mock tudor beams.
Once the pressure mounted those properties that had not been privatised were handed over by the local authority to housing associations.
Two years ago the impact of the twin policies of the Labour Controlled Council and the Thatcher Government had resulted in the highest concentration of Housing Association Properties in Salford being concentrated in Little Hulton.
Of the properties in Little Hulton and Walkden 65% are privately owned and 35% owned by Housing Associations, comparative figures for the UK are 82% privately owned and 10% owned by Housing Associations.
But that was two years ago.
The numbers are changing dramatically. The Lobby Group Million Homes, Million Lives is now reporting that the number of owner occupiers could fall nationally as low as 49% by 2041 based on current numbers which have fallen to 65%.
It seems that the direct consequence of right to buy, as pointed out by James Meek in the LRB, amongst others, is the rapid increase in private landlords, many of whose portfolios include large numbers of former Local Authority properties.
The tragedy of the collapse of the post war vision, characterised as 'Homes for Heroes', is that the continuing desire for home ownership cannot be fulfilled, the report above characterises a new and emerging 'Generation Rent', relying on the private landlord, who by design or necessity can offer neither the security or the necessary support once provided by the local authority in its role as Landlord or indeed in some recently publicised cases simply refusing to accept as tenants any who are on benefits including housing benefit.
There are always good news stories to be found and publicly rehearsed but as Salford's Joint Strategic Needs Assessment reveals there is a high concentration of social properties with low private home ownership indicating low incomes, benefit dependency and potentially, fuel poverty and health issues.
Diversifying tenure is recommended as a way of achieving an improved housing choice and a more sustainable community.
It is certainly better, than cutting benefits, sanctioning spare rooms and creating housing and economic stress.
Little Hulton was once famously characterised by one of its famous Sons, Sean Ryder of the Happy Mondays, (the actor Christopher Eccleston is another famous son along with Paul Ryder), as a place better escaped from.
Together with the neighbouring parish of St Pauls, Peel and parts of the nearby town of Walkden nearly 60,000 people lived on a vast council estate.
In the mid seventies Salford local authority was busy demolishing the inner city slum dwellings and employed a housing nominations policy which favoured those whose houses were being cleared.
The consequence of this policy was that young people in Little Hulton were not offered housing on the estate near their families and in their own communities and instead when they married moved off the estate often into private, mortgaged properties in the towns that ringed Little Hulton and ran along the East Lancashire Road towards Liverpool, and in the process affecting the communities sustainability.
With Right to Buy, Margaret Thatcher's iconic housing initiative, property in Little Hulton was sold to existing tenants at massive discounts and it was soon possible to recognise the privatised properties as they sported, porches and mock tudor beams.
Once the pressure mounted those properties that had not been privatised were handed over by the local authority to housing associations.
Two years ago the impact of the twin policies of the Labour Controlled Council and the Thatcher Government had resulted in the highest concentration of Housing Association Properties in Salford being concentrated in Little Hulton.
Of the properties in Little Hulton and Walkden 65% are privately owned and 35% owned by Housing Associations, comparative figures for the UK are 82% privately owned and 10% owned by Housing Associations.
But that was two years ago.
The numbers are changing dramatically. The Lobby Group Million Homes, Million Lives is now reporting that the number of owner occupiers could fall nationally as low as 49% by 2041 based on current numbers which have fallen to 65%.
It seems that the direct consequence of right to buy, as pointed out by James Meek in the LRB, amongst others, is the rapid increase in private landlords, many of whose portfolios include large numbers of former Local Authority properties.
The tragedy of the collapse of the post war vision, characterised as 'Homes for Heroes', is that the continuing desire for home ownership cannot be fulfilled, the report above characterises a new and emerging 'Generation Rent', relying on the private landlord, who by design or necessity can offer neither the security or the necessary support once provided by the local authority in its role as Landlord or indeed in some recently publicised cases simply refusing to accept as tenants any who are on benefits including housing benefit.
There are always good news stories to be found and publicly rehearsed but as Salford's Joint Strategic Needs Assessment reveals there is a high concentration of social properties with low private home ownership indicating low incomes, benefit dependency and potentially, fuel poverty and health issues.
Diversifying tenure is recommended as a way of achieving an improved housing choice and a more sustainable community.
It is certainly better, than cutting benefits, sanctioning spare rooms and creating housing and economic stress.
As Vicar I lived in the Vicarage next door to the church.
Even that house, surrounded as it was by a tree lined garden, was not immune to the housing crisis.
In 1976 during a long hot summer the foundations of the house cracked and the house split from top to bottom, coming to rest with a massive gap at the top of the wall requiring part demolition and rebuilding on new foundations.
If Pisa's Tower had been built to the same specification it would never have leaned.
It was the collapse of the Vicarage that led to me writing an application for a new job in the North East sitting at my desk tapping my feet to the accompaniment of pneumatic drilling outside.
For me, as for Sean Ryder, Little Hulton had become a place to escape from ........ and in the process I became Britain's first punk vicar, but that's a story for another blog!
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