Examination of Witnesses (Questions 20
- 28)
TUESDAY 12 DECEMBER 2006
MR ADAM
SAMPSON AND
MR MARK
THOMAS
Q20 Dr Pugh:
Those sorts of people are very reluctant to render themselves
homeless because they then lose all their rights. Effectively,
they do not have a home of their own, though they have actually,
in some cases, got a roof over their head. In my constituency,
when somebody comes in dire housing need, I refer them to a social
enterprise run by a religious organisation which seems to be able
to field most cases that are thrown at them by virtue of buying
up old property, doing it up and then getting the housing benefit
to repay the mortgage. That is a kind of model which obviously
works reasonably well because the social enterprise in question
now owns hundreds of properties. Why do the housing associations
not go down that road? What is weak about that particular model,
if I might put it like that? Why is it that when I have a really
truly valid case of homelessness, I refer them to this social
enterprise and not to the housing association which cannot deal
so reactively and quickly as this can?
Mr Sampson: I suspect I know the
social enterprise concerned and indeed met them about three weeks
ago to discuss this. I am not sufficiently familiar with the model,
other than an hour's meeting with them, and I found them very
impressive, but I find quite a lot of people very impressive,
and it is not until I see the detail that I can absolutely endorse
them. I have learned my lesson here. If there is a criticism here,
it is that all this is doing is recycling existing stock; none
of it is actually going in to create new stock, which is fine
because it is meeting acute housing need of the type you describe.
However, and we will come onto this when I hope we spend some
time discussing the private rented sector, which is an area that
we are particularly interested in, some of these properties, albeit
relatively few as far as I am aware, are empty and long-term empty.
We are talking about the displacement of people who might otherwise
be housed in favour of those who are in most acute housing need
and that is the fundamental problem. The fundamental problem in
this country is a shortage of supply and though very creative
ways of recycling existing stock to meet need are all very well,
in the end what we need to see is an increase in supply overall.
Q21 Dr Pugh:
So, it is not just that the housing associations react more slowly
because they have bigger overheads and your bureaucracy and stuff
like that.
Mr Sampson: That said, it would
be profoundly useful for housing associations to use the sort
of model we are talking about in order to extend mixed communities
into areas which are mono-tenure at the moment but mono-tenure
in a way we do not tend to talk about much, which is mono-tenure
of rich, privately-owned estates. Along with breaking up of mono-tenure
council estates by creating some home owners there, it would be
quite nice to be seeing the breaking up of mono-tenure, privately-owned
estates by creating some areas of social housing in there, in
pursuit of the mixed communities' agenda.
Q22 Dr Pugh:
May I take you back to housing benefit and the changes afoot?
You have been fairly critical of local housing allowance and it
is not entirely clear to me what your reasons are. Do you fear
that people will squander money allocated to them which ought
to go to landlords who will give them a safe and secure abode,
as it were? Is it to do with poor financial management by people
who are in the homeless category? Is it that you fear it simply
will affect the market in an adverse way and just create less
property for homeless people?
Mr Thomas: I hope we have not
come across as entirely critical of local housing allowance.
Q23 Dr Pugh:
Sort of critical.
Mr Thomas: Broadly speaking, we
do think it is a good thing. We have some reservations but it
has produced a number of benefits. First, one of simplicity and,
in the context of a housing benefit system which is horrendously
complex, that is a very good thing, not least because it can help
to speed up the administrative side of the system which is extremely
important. In addition to that, in the pathfinder area—
Q24 Dr Pugh:
Can you just explain why you think it will speed up the administrative
side, because there will be an administrative burden of some kind,
will there not?
Mr Thomas: Because rent officers
will no longer have to undertake individual determinations on
properties. You will have flat rates set for particular areas,
according to the category of housing it actually falls into and
the number of people, so there will be less work there and the
broad experience has been that there has been some speeding up.
To come back to the other benefit, we have seen overall in the
pathfinder areas some reduction in the level of housing benefit
shortfalls that people are experiencing and that is also really
important. There are some caveats though. We have done some research
across a number of the pathfinder and non-pathfinder areas to
look into the detailed impact of the changes and we found that
there are quite significant disparities in terms of the impact,
both in terms of comparing different areas of the country, the
levels of reduction in benefit shortfall that have been experienced
and therefore the proportion of the private rented sector that
claimants are actually able to access. There are some really big
disparities there.
Q25 Chair: May
I just ask whether that research has yet been published?
Mr Thomas: Yes.
Q26 Chair: It
has; so we could get a copy of it and then we shall have the detail.
Mr Thomas: Yes, so I shall not
go into the detail. The other thing is the experience of under-25s
without children. The single room rent remains under the new system
and that group has not seen a nearly equivalent increase and actually
still continues to face real problems. We are continuing to push
really hard as the Bill progresses to get the Government to rethink
on that one.
Q27 Chair: I
am afraid that we have come up against the end of our time. I
noted that you wanted to make some remarks about the private-rented
sector. All I can suggest is that you might want to sit and listen
to the next set of witnesses and if you want to send us another
additional written response after that, then that would be very
helpful.
Mr Sampson: I can sum up in 10
seconds.
Q28 Chair: Okay;
10 seconds.
Mr Sampson: What we wish to say
about the private-rented sector is that we believe that the time
is long overdue for the Government to come up with a strategy
for the development of a private-rented sector. Huge changes have
taken place in the sector with the growth of the buy-to-let market,
and what that has created is a sector which is new, which is highly
volatile, which is not professional in any sense at all. At the
same time, the sector is being used to house increasingly vulnerable
people who might otherwise be going down the homelessness route.
Under those circumstances it is imperative, particularly given
the fact that the sector is going to have to absorb a significant
number of new people, given demographic changes, that Government
think about the way that regulation and indeed the use of direct
or indirect subsidy—£3 billion a year goes into that
sector through housing benefit—how those things can be fitted
together in order to create or foster a more professional and
expanded private rented sector. We should like to see that as
a recommendation.
Chair: Thank you very much.
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