From the BBC:
[Owen] Smith has called for the current funding system to be abolished and replaced with a 1%-2% graduate tax. He also promised a high-level apprenticeship to every 18-year-old who gets the grades…
He also promised to build 50,000 "first homes" a year, earmarked for under-30s, which would be rented to first-time buyers at 80% of the local market rent, with the remaining 20% going into a savings pot.
Student loans are currently repaid via a 9% graduate tax, and even that is only enough to repay about half the loans. Reducing that to 1% or 2% is of course much better, but does not explain where the rest of the money will come from.
We summarised the amounts involved and the obvious way forward in our higher education manifesto.
He also promised to build 50,000 "first homes" a year, earmarked for under-30s, which would be rented to first-time buyers at 80% of the local market rent, with the remaining 20% going into a savings pot.
Aargh! That doesn't even make sense; are tenants supposed to pay 100% of the 'market rent' and be given 20% of it back somehow? It's nowhere near enough either. If everybody is to have a chance of obtaining such a home, they would need to build about 300,000 a year, not just 50,000, which wouldn't even show up as a blip.
YPP housing/planning manifesto here.
Sunday, 28 August 2016
Thursday, 25 August 2016
YPP (London) Meet-up, tomorrow Friday 26 August
5.20 to 7.30 or so, The Brewmaster, Leicester Square Tube Exit 1, turn left and left again into the alleyway (St Martin's Court).
We put a yellow YPP leaflet on the table (if we can grab one!) so that you can recognise us. Contact me at gmwadsworth@gmail.com or on 07954 59 07 44 if you need more info.
Topics: Reverse takeover of the LVT Campaign.
Saturday, 20 August 2016
Beyond smug.
From the BBC:
Private landlords in the UK received twice as much in housing benefit last year - £9.3bn - as they did a decade ago, a report says. The National Housing Federation (NHF) study said the increase was due to a big rise in the number of private tenants claiming housing benefit. The NHF said this particular group of people had grown by 42% since 2008…
A government spokesman said it had been taking action to bring the housing benefit bill under control. He said: "Since 2012 the amount going to private sector landlords has actually been falling - something which the National Housing Federation fails to recognise."
That is probably true, the total bill has been hovering around £10 bn for quite a few years.
"We are also committed to building the homes this country needs and investing £8bn to build 400,000 more affordable homes."
That is a lie, or at best a dishonest use of the word "committed", he does not say over how many years. Make a note of the numbers though. They claim they will spend £8 bn (over an unspecified number of years) on building 400,000 homes = £200,000 per home, thus they are vastly overpaying for the land, this is less than what they firehose at landlords each year. Not only that, for every £1 they spend on building new council houses, they will save more than £1 in future because they will have more rental income and/or lower HB bills, so it is not really a cost, it is an investment in the truest sense of the word.
Here comes the stomach churning bit:
Chris Norris, head of policy at the National Landlords Association, said the private rented sector was responding to the increasing demand for homes from a growing proportion of tenants who are being failed by the social housing sector and housing associations.
"The NHF is clearly still reeling from the news that its members have been ordered by government to reduce spending over the next four years, so it comes as no surprise that they are looking to shift the emphasis and point the finger elsewhere.
"However, the private rented sector plays a pivotal role in providing much-needed homes for tenants so there seems no real purpose in the NHF taking a cheap shot at landlords for what is a failure on behalf of successive governments to adequately allocate its housing budget and to incentivise the building of new homes."
That misallocation is precisely what is benefitting his members, every penny spent on HB for private landlords is a penny wasted and a penny not invested in bricks and mortar.
Private landlords in the UK received twice as much in housing benefit last year - £9.3bn - as they did a decade ago, a report says. The National Housing Federation (NHF) study said the increase was due to a big rise in the number of private tenants claiming housing benefit. The NHF said this particular group of people had grown by 42% since 2008…
A government spokesman said it had been taking action to bring the housing benefit bill under control. He said: "Since 2012 the amount going to private sector landlords has actually been falling - something which the National Housing Federation fails to recognise."
That is probably true, the total bill has been hovering around £10 bn for quite a few years.
"We are also committed to building the homes this country needs and investing £8bn to build 400,000 more affordable homes."
That is a lie, or at best a dishonest use of the word "committed", he does not say over how many years. Make a note of the numbers though. They claim they will spend £8 bn (over an unspecified number of years) on building 400,000 homes = £200,000 per home, thus they are vastly overpaying for the land, this is less than what they firehose at landlords each year. Not only that, for every £1 they spend on building new council houses, they will save more than £1 in future because they will have more rental income and/or lower HB bills, so it is not really a cost, it is an investment in the truest sense of the word.
Here comes the stomach churning bit:
Chris Norris, head of policy at the National Landlords Association, said the private rented sector was responding to the increasing demand for homes from a growing proportion of tenants who are being failed by the social housing sector and housing associations.
"The NHF is clearly still reeling from the news that its members have been ordered by government to reduce spending over the next four years, so it comes as no surprise that they are looking to shift the emphasis and point the finger elsewhere.
"However, the private rented sector plays a pivotal role in providing much-needed homes for tenants so there seems no real purpose in the NHF taking a cheap shot at landlords for what is a failure on behalf of successive governments to adequately allocate its housing budget and to incentivise the building of new homes."
That misallocation is precisely what is benefitting his members, every penny spent on HB for private landlords is a penny wasted and a penny not invested in bricks and mortar.
Thursday, 4 August 2016
YPP meet-up, tomorrow Friday 5 August
5.20 to 7.30 or so, The Brewmaster, Leicester Square Tube Exit 1, turn left and left again into the alleyway (St Martin's Court).
We put a yellow YPP leaflet on the table so that you can recognise us.
Contact me at gmwadsworth@gmail.com or on 07954 59 07 44 if you need more info.
We put a yellow YPP leaflet on the table so that you can recognise us.
Contact me at gmwadsworth@gmail.com or on 07954 59 07 44 if you need more info.
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