Both of the national governments in Scotland and Wales support affordable housing and are opposed to the extension of the 'Right to Buy' law which, although good for individuals, has decimated the stock of affordable and social housing in both nations and contributed to a housing crisis.
Scotland's Deputy First Minister Nicola Sturgeon made an eye-catching announcement at the SNP Conference that they will abolish this law for all new tenants in social housing, first introduced under Thatcher's rule. This means that up to 18,000 homes in Scotland will remain available for the poorest in society, rather than disappearing into the property market. The Labour opposition will probably support this, having been wrong-footed.
In Wales we have a slightly less strident approach, with the Welsh Government's Housing Minister Jocelyn Davies (a Plaid Cymru AM) having launched the neccesary legislative bid to suspend the Right to Buy in areas of pressure on social housing (surely the whole of Wales?). Yet because of our limited devolution settlement MPs at Westminster have the say on this and are already delaying the bid. Tory MPs have indicated they won't support giving Wales the final decision on something which was originally their law, placing party politics as more important than constitutional rights.
Affordable housing in Wales has been in decline for decades now and its about time things were turned around.
The upcoming referendum is extremely important. Even though it won't change much and we will still be short of what Scotland has, we will be able to legislate on issues like housing without having our laws blocked and delayed by yesterday's men at Westminster.
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the critical problem of the scarcity of social housing that has resulted from the so called 'right to buy' policy has of course been compounded by the fact that council house building in the uk has virtually ground to a halt...with wales suffering as much as anywhere!
So while the outright abolition of the right to buy throughout wales would be most welcome it would not on its own be enough to alleviate the dire situation that exists in most parts of wales as regards the scarcity of affordable housing!
It is hard to believe now but there was time when the british govt actually gave a damn about whether there was sufficient decent and affordable housing for its people! Thus shortly after the second world war a welsh socialist oversaw the buidling of two MILLION council properties!
shamefully the current labour govt has spent its 12 years in power trying to bribe councils to sell off their remaining housing stock to fancily named trusts ie privaitisation by the backdoor!
So clearly the sooner the assembly gets control of housing in wales the better...maybe then we can actually start building some council houses in wales!
Finally we should not forget that people also have a 'right to rent' ...indeed i would argue that acccess to decent affordable housing is actually a human right!
Leigh Richards
Swansea
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