Social housing investment: Housing policy and finance in the UK and the Netherlands, 1970–1992

Chapter 14 highlights the key themes of the book and their implications for policy. Although there is considerable agreement among economists with regard to the range of required policy reforms - including changes to land use planning, taxation, social housing provision, rents and subsidies, and to financial markets - there are external constraints, both political and economic, that impose limitations on even the most positive reforming governments. But the absence of positive policy change in the UK would imply that the worsening affordability and volatility that have often typified housing markets are likely to continue. The book shows the need to extend housing policy beyond a concentration on expanding supply and points to the need for a more balanced approach that incorporates policies addressing demand as well as the supply sides of housing. Given the policy constraints, the chapter also points to possible new directions.

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The 2008 financial crash continues

The Property Lobby ◽

10.1332/policypress/9781447340492.003.0007 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 99-106

Author(s):

Bob Colenutt

Keyword(s):

Social Housing ◽

Banking System ◽

Housing Crisis ◽

Property Market ◽

Housing Investment ◽

The Us ◽

Boom And Bust ◽

Overseas Investment ◽

The Uk ◽

House Building

The 2008 Crash and its continuing aftermath have had a lasting impact on the scale and persistence of the housing crisis. The chapter explains that the Crash was largely caused by over lending to residential property in the US but the contagion spread to the UK banking system. It argues that the fall out continues to affect the market in a number of ways notably credit policies housing investment and cut backs in public expenditure. The banking system and the property market were bailed out and the austerity decade has reduced the capacity and ability of local government to build social housing or compensate for the fall in private sector house building. It is argued that the UK housing market is particularly subject to boom and bust fuelled by speculation and overseas investment yet the planners were scapegoated by the Treasury for the collapse on house building after 2008.

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Did increasing new refugees’ access to social housing reduce homelessness? Evidence from a quasi-experiment

10.31235/osf.io/tey4d ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Meng Le Zhang ◽

Sin Yi Cheung ◽

Jenny Phillimore

Keyword(s):

Lower Bound ◽

Housing Policy ◽

Social Housing ◽

Natural Experiment ◽

Support Service ◽

Causal Effects ◽

Home Office ◽

The Uk ◽

Quasi Experiment

Policies for resettling refugees are of utmost salience across Europe. The Home Office introduced the National Asylum Support Service (NASS) in 1999, which pursued a policy of evicting refugees from social housing within 28 days of gaining permission to remain in the UK. By contrast, changes in Scottish housing policy beginning in 2001 prioritised refugees for social housing. We investigate whether the Scottish policy reduced refugee homelessness eight months after permission to remain, using nonresponse rates of the 2005-2009 Survey of New Refugees as a lower-bound proxy for homelessness. NASS’s quasi-random scheme for allocating refugees across the UK represents a natural experiment for measuring plausibly causal effects. We find that refugees assigned to Glasgow, Scotland had a significantly lower homelessness rate than comparable refugees assigned to live elsewhere in the UK. We attribute this effect to allowing refugees priority access to social housing, discounting potential confounders and other mediators.

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Performance agreements to ensure societal legitimacy in the social housing sector; an embedded case study of implementation in the Netherlands

Journal of Housing and the Built Environment ◽

10.1007/s10901-020-09818-5 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

S. G. J. Plettenburg ◽

T. Hoppe ◽

H. M. H. van der Heijden ◽

M. G. Elsinga

Keyword(s):

The Netherlands ◽

Housing Policy ◽

Social Housing ◽

Urban Areas ◽

Policy Making ◽

Central Government ◽

Housing Sector ◽

Housing Associations ◽

The Social

AbstractIn 2015 the Housing Act was revised in order to further regulate the social housing sector in the Netherlands and thereby improve the steering possibilities for the central government to coordinate housing associations. This included local performance agreements for social housing policy obtaining a legal status. By introducing this policy instrument central government seeks to facilitate and ensure the tri-partite cooperation between municipalities, housing associations and tenants’ organisations in order to release funds by housing associations for social benefit. This should improve the position of municipalities and tenants’ organisations in social housing, and improve legitimate policy making. In this paper the main research question is: How are local performance agreements implemented targeting increased societal legitimacy in local social housing policy making, and what are its strengths and weaknesses in three selected cases in the Netherlands? A case study research design was used involving three local embedded case studies. As a theoretical framework the Contextual Interaction Theory was used. Data collection involved expert interviews and review of policy documents. Results reveal several weaknesses that impede the implementation of performance agreements, including issues in the broader governance regime and context, as well as issues with the inter-organisational structure and stakeholder interaction regarding the tri-partite cooperation between the key actors. This has to do with the precarious role of the tenants’ organisations in the process, and the local housing policy as the basis of local performance agreements. Results also show that implementation of performance agreements is more difficult in cities with dense urban areas.

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Local authority perspectives on community planning and localism: a case study

Social Determinantsof Health ◽

10.1332/policypress/9781447336846.003.0015 ◽

2017 ◽

Author(s):

Joyce Melican

Keyword(s):

Housing Policy ◽

Social Housing ◽

Local Authority ◽

Housing Stock ◽

Community Planning ◽

Historical Background ◽

London Borough ◽

Competitive Tendering ◽

The Face ◽

The Uk

This chapter examines the perspectives of local authorities on community planning and localism by focusing on the case of the London Borough of Sutton and reflecting on the author's experience in working at the London Borough of Croydon as a housing project leader. It begins with a brief historical background on social housing policy in the UK and describes how the London Borough of Sutton was forced to divest itself of its housing stock to illustrate the complex and political nature of the local authority perspective on housing. It then considers a range of policies introduced by the UK government in an attempt to change the face and ownership of social housing, including compulsory competitive tendering (CCT), the Right to Buy enshrined in the Housing Act 1980, and the Housing and Planning Bill 2015. The chapter concludes by discussing what is needed in housing policy.

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Asylum-seekers falsely implicating themselves in international crimes: Should they be informed of the existence of Article 1F of the Refugee Convention?

MIGRATION LETTERS ◽

10.33182/ml.v12i1.259 ◽

2014 ◽

Vol 12 (1) ◽

pp. 91-101

Author(s):

Brian Moore ◽

Joris van Wijk

Keyword(s):

The Netherlands ◽

Case Studies ◽

Asylum Seekers ◽

Refugee Convention ◽

International Crimes ◽

Refugee Claim ◽

The Uk ◽

National Governments

Case studies in the Netherlands and the UK of asylum applicants excluded or under consideration of exclusion pursuant to Article 1Fa of the Refugee Convention reveal that some applicants falsely implicated themselves in serious crimes or behaviours in order to enhance their refugee claim. This may have serious consequences for the excluded persons themselves, as well as for national governments dealing with them. For this reason we suggest immigration authorities could consider forewarning asylum applicants i.e. before their interview, about the existence, purpose and possible consequences of exclusion on the basis of Article 1F.

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