'High Earners Should Live On Council Estates' (UK)

Higher earners should live alongside poorer households to achieve a better mix in housing, a Government-commissioned report said yesterday.

Prof John Hills said housing policy should be changed to avoid having "rich people on one side and poorer people on the other side of the tracks".

In a report to Ruth Kelly, the Communities Secretary, he suggested that the complete redevelopment of estates might some times be "the only alternative".

He also called for social landlords to buy housing in other areas and for vacant land on traditional council estates to be used to build private homes.

Prof Hills, of the London School of Economics, said ending security of tenure for council tenants would be "a very unhelpful move" and that it would discourage residents from improving their income.

It would also work against improving the social mix by forcing out higher earners.

Prof Hills said social housing had been intended to avoid having "rich people on one side of the tracks and poorer people on the other side of the tracks". But communities had become polarised over the decades.

"We built these areas and originally they did have a mix," he said. But the mix had been broken down over time, and "we have ended up with nearly half of all social housing in the poorest 20 per cent of neighbourhoods".

Rebuilding the worst estates was a costly, but some times inevitable, option. "There are clearly places where the design and the way they were built and their reputations have developed mean there is little alternative but to redevelop them," he said.

But he stressed that it was a "very expensive" option and caused years of upheaval in residents' lives.

Prof Hills called for more choice for social housing tenants, including more help for them to buy their own homes and regular reviews of their circumstances to see if they were able to buy a stake in their homes.

Responding to the report, Miss Kelly said building more social housing was a priority.

She indicated the Government wanted to expand the opportunity of home ownership to more tenants and was looking at ways of offering tenants the opportunity to own a stake in their own property.

Miss Kelly said for many a life-time secure social tenancy would be appropriate, but for others it should be seen more as a "stepping stone".

The Conservatives said the system for selling council homes to tenants was "needlessly bureaucratic".

Liberal Democrat housing spokesman Dan Rogerson said it was important not to "deter people from working or push them off estates where they are happy and established".

Prof Hills's independent report found that levels of tenant satisfaction were "disappointing".

One in seven tenants were dissatisfied with their local area and their accommodation, one in five with their landlord, and one in four with repairs and maintenance.

On traditional council housing estates, more than a fifth of residents reported drug users or dealers as a serious problem.

On traditional council housing estates, more than a fifth of residents reported drug users or dealers as a serious problem.

These social architects are striving against human nature. They do not have a chance (barring force) of getting people who can afford to choose their place of residence of voluntarily choosing to live in proximity to government housing.

The second statement above shows why people do not want to live near government housing. Where people do not have to work they find something to do with the ample free time they have. Inevitably drug use will be a substantial part of that leisure time. And some industrious individuals will step up to supply the demand for recreational drugs. The presence of these entrepreneurs has a tendency to drive out those who desire to live in a more sedate neighborhood.

Polarization of neighborhoods has always and always will occur. People gravitate to their own kind.

The dense cities and towns of days gone by were built without benefit of zoning and government control, because people are naturally social creatures and wish to live with other people, do business with them, enjoy leisure together, play at sport together, govern their community cooperatively and worship together. With the advent of zoning, the government stranglehold on modes of transportation, and tax and lending policy to favor expansive suburbs and to break-up large estates and farms in the coutnryside, along with the concentration of the criminal element of the country into stable urban neighborhoods by means of public housing, its no surprise we got what we set about to make by force of government, and what the Communists always wanted - the destruction of the countryside by the emptying out of the cities, and people beholden in their very livelihood at work and securing food and the ability to communicate and travel by need for government permit and thus government control - the drivers license.

We used to laugh about the regimented way of life in the Soviet Union, and their need for an internal passport to travel. But that is exactly what we have now in the US - you can't drive or fly without a drivers license, and if you want to take mass transit to avoid this licensure, you will find it entirely controlled by the government.

And we used to laugh at the regimented housing and control of how their citizens could live by the Soviets. But that is what we have to deal with in modern developments. The plans must be approved by the zoning and safety officials and the government engineer. Businesses, houses of worship, and recreational opporuntities are excluded from the developments by zoning to force reliance upon the governmentally controlled automobile travel and to prevent people from easily gathering together to discuss the issues of the day. Frequently the developers are forced to include an association which governs what you are allowed to do with your own property, and which assesses yet more taxes and fees. And when you want to make changes to your property, you suddenly find you need more permits and permissions from the government to build simple items like fences, pools, porches, flagpoles, and additional rooms on your dwelling. You might affect their sacred "set-back" requirements which are nothing more than a reminder that you don't really own or control the land your house rests on, or have too many bedrooms on your property or too much square footage of building for your lot, or - the horror - build an in-law apartment over your garage! God forbid you make your house look different from everyone else, try to rent a room, or hang out a shingle to run a home business from your basement.

And no the cities aren't any better. The same crapola is present in them now that most of their decent citizens have been forced to relocate to the suburbs and countryside be means of crime the government refuses to control, schools they have run into the ground, streets and utilities they neglect to maintain, and businesses they have chased out of town. All thanks to the various Planning Acts and Transportation Acts.

Its sad that it is impossible for a community to refuse to allow a porn shop or abortion clinic or strip club or church of satan to open and operate in their jurisdiction, but a community can dictate the most simple details of how you are allowed to modify or build your own home.

"6. Centralization of the means of communication and transportation in the hands of the State
"9. Combination of agriculture with manufacturing industries, gradual abolition of the distinction between town and country, by a more equitable distribution of population over the country." (Karl Marx, Communist Manifesto, Plank #9)

Sprawl advocates are always very eager to ignore who their father is and what his goals were.

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