Rediscovering Housing Need in England

David Robinson

Centre for Regional Economic and Social ResearchSheffield Hallam University

HSA Conference, University of York, 19 March 2012

Overview

Laying the Foundations: A Housing Strategy for England

Values and Failures: Narratives of Housing Need

Re-engaging Neglected Narratives

Laying the Foundations:

A Housing Strategy for EnglandHM Government 2011

This is a radical and unashamedly ambitious strategy – and it has two main aims. First, to help drive local economies and create jobs. Unblocking the market will provide a much-needed boost to employment. Second, these plans are designed to spread opportunity in our society. For too long, millions have been locked out of home ownership. We want to build an economy that works for everyone, one in which people who work hard and play by the rules can expect to own a decent home of their own. This goes right to the heart of what this Government is about.

David Cameron and Nick Clegg (Foreword)

For the individual:

Housing is crucial for our social mobility, health and wellbeing – with quality and choice having an impact on social mobility and wellbeing from an early age, and our homes accounting for about half of all household wealth. Social housing should provide support for those who need it, when they need it, and should help vulnerable people to live independently. And opportunities for wealth must be open to all, with housing choices helping rather than hindering people’s ability to build assets and find employment

 

For society and the economy:

Housing is inextricably linked to the wider health of the economy, the financial markets and consumer confidence. …. Getting house building moving again is crucial for economic growth …. Without building new homes our economic recovery will take longer than it needs to.

Eric Pickles (Executive Summary)

 

Improving social mobility – helping everyone to enjoy that freedom to succeed – is the principal aim of the Government’s social policy. And to achieve this aim, we need to recognise the fundamentally important role that housing can play in supporting social mobility.

People will want and need different things from housing throughout their lives. But there are common threads. People need to find housing in the right place – enabling them to find work, to maintain contacts with friends and family, and often to provide care. Housing needs to be suitable for the size and shape of the household ..... And housing can be a source of wealth – opening opportunities at critical life stages, such as helping children with their education or into home ownership in their own right.

When these essential elements are not provided, housing can act as a brake on rather than as an engine of social mobility. Unfortunately, in recent years this has too often been the reality.

(Chapter 1 Housing: the need for a new approach, p1)

Priorities

•social mobility•household wealth•economic growth•households unable to exercise market choice

Responses

•increase demand - help for buyers•increase supply - planning reforms•target the most vulnerable - reform social housing

Observed Silences - Problems Exacerbated

•quality / conditions•security•affordability•utility

Observed Silences

26.5% of all homes non-decent; 37.4% PRS

increasing overcrowding in social housing (7.3%) and PRS (5.6%)

128,000 households have given up their home due to mortgage difficulties since 2005 (24.7% of total)

23.4% increase in rough sleeping 2010-2011

insecurity in PRS - 32.5 % moved in last year; 19% PRS tenants with dependent children moved within sector in previous year

62.3% of under 40 households in England cannot afford to buy

English Housing Survey, 2010; Wilcox and Bramley, 2010

Problems Exacerbated

'flexible' tenancies in social housing - end to security of tenure

80% market rents in social housing - problems of affordability; barrier to work

under-occupation HB reductions - shortfall between HB and rent; insufficient suitably sized accommodation; forced mobility

benefits cap - shortfall between HB and rent; impact on households with 3/4 children and in high rent areas; rising poverty; increased overcrowding

WHY?

Values and Failures:

Narratives of Housing Need

society tends to regard some level of housing provision as a necessity, irrespective of income and wealth or of the costs of provision

because the outcome of the market is thought unacceptable, suitable definitions of what is regarded as adequate must be developed

definitions involve assessments rooted in value judgements about the distributional failures that housing policy is seeking to overcome

Whitehead (1991)

what values and what failures?

Failures•Market unable to provide adequate housing at acceptable price•poor living conditionsValues•Housing as merit good•Focus on social externalities•Public provision worthwhile to meet need•Defined social objectivesNotions of Need•Supply•Deficit•Sanitary Delivery•Public sector delivery mechanisms•regulation of the private sector

19452012

Failures•Market prevented from adjusting in response to problems•restricted access to ownershipValues•Housing as a private good / commodity•Households choose housing standards•Focus on economic externalities•Defined economic objectivesNotions of Need•Supply•Vulnerability•SanitaryDelivery•Market orientated delivery mechanisms•Targeted public provision

Narratives of Housing NeedTradition Focus Interest Measure Concept Examples

Sanitary public health and environ standards

collective need

standard of dwellings

normative - set by experts

slum clearancebuilding controlsimproving stock

Deficit affordabilityqualityspace

individual need

shortfall of households in suitable housing

normative - set by experts

public buildingregulation

Supply balance between demand and supply

individual need

supply v demand affordability ratios

normative - set by experts

public buildinghousing targetsplanning reformspromoting demand

Vulnerability needy / priority groups

individual need

households unable to exercise market-based choice

normative - set by experts

'special needs' housinghousing supportrationing of SRS

Diversity cultural sensitivity & specific community needs

individual need

deficit from user defined standards

felt / expressed - articulated by users

sensitised designtargeted supportanti-harassment and community development

1945 2012

Interdiscursivity: Narratives Through Time

1979

Deficit

Supply

Vulnerability

Diversity

Sanitary

Statu

s

observed silences and exacerbated problems reflect the demise of the deficit tradition

housing less readily recognised as a merit good

neglect of social externalities

a re-articulation of orders of discourse

analytic tip - the displacement of one set of terms and constructs by a different set within a pre-existing public discourse (Roe, 1994)

....with material consequences

Re-engaging with Neglected Narratives

of Housing Need

Returning to first principles....

recognising social externalities - the historic underpinnings of housing policy

acknowledge housing as a merit good - individually and collectively

relating notions of housing need to material realities and foregrounding well-being

....radical and contentious - challenging what is currently thinkable

Reflecting on Social Externalities

Theme Problems Adverse Effects

Conditions • damp and condensation• fire risk• safety hazards

• accidents in the home• house fires• poor health

Utility • overcrowding• suitability and appropriateness

of housing

• mental and physical health• childhood development, growth and

education• personal safety• problems living independently• forced dependency on family/services

Security • restricted right of occupation• insecurity and unpredictability• affordability

• forced mobility• displacement from education/work• severing of support networks• limited sense of belonging / community• homelessness• mental health

Affordability • access to finance • difficulties meeting housing

costs

• constrained choices (tenure, location, size, quality)

• problems of access• insecurity and the risk of homelessness• poverty

The Mundane Becomes Contentious....

Housing need may be defined as the quantity of housing that is required to provide accommodation of an agreed minimum standard and above for a population given its size, household composition, age distribution etc., without taking into account the individual household's ability to pay for the housing assigned to it.

 

The 'agreed minimum standard' should be such that housing above this standard ['decent housing'] is the only housing which is acceptable. Decent housing would provide adequate shelter to households and produce no negative externalities. That is, it would impose no external costs on the individual or community.

Robinson (1979, pp 56-57)

Some important caveats - vulnerability and diversity

the failings of the 'metanarrative' - presumption that universalistic notions and measures are superior to local or more grounded stories

universalistic standards might not always be in line with specific consumers' priorities

a focus on physical targets and aesthetics can result in disregard for occupiers and their individual notions of home and need

existing policy levers might not be capable of meeting identified need

Harrison (2004)

In Conclusion

observed silences - condition, utility and security rarely mentioned

policy focus on putting right factors limiting effective operation of the market; targeting public provision on vulnerable/deserving unable to exercise market choice

emphasis reflects dominance of particular notion of need rooted in particular value judgements about market limitations and failures and the measures available in response

reflecting on externalities renders explicit the failures that are being prioritised and the problems that are being neglected (condition; utility; security; affordability)

returning to first principles proves radical and contentious in present context

value of re-engaging with, challenging and recasting notions of housing need

References

Department for Communities and Local Government (2012) English Housing Survey. London: DCLG.

Harrison, M. (2004) Defining housing quality and environment: disability, standards and social factors. Housing Studies, 19, 5, 691-708.

HM Government (2011) Laying the Foundations: A Housing Strategy for England. London: DCLG.

Robinson, R (1979) Housing Economics and Public Policy. London: Macmillan.

Roe, E. (1994) Narrative Policy Analysis: Theory and Practice. Duke University Press.

Whitehead, C. (1991) From need to affordability: an analysis of UK housing objectives. Urban Studies, 28, 6, 1991 871-887.

Wilcox, S. and Bramley, G. (2010) Evaluating requirements for market and affordable housing. Fareham: NHPAU.