Peter A. Kemp

Housing and social policy

Exploring Social Policy - Housing as Social Policy - Housing Disadvantage - Assistance with Housing Costs - Homelessness - Housing and Community Care for People with Learning Difficulties - Housing and Community Care for Older People - Housing Management and Social Policy - Conclusions

Low-income Tenants in the Private Rental Housing Market

The private rented sector (PRS) in England has often been described as having a ‘residual’ role in accommodating low-income households who are unable to gain access to social housing. This paper examines the accuracy of this residual role thesis. It does so using secondary analysis of the 2007 English House Condition Survey. The paper shows that the PRS plays a disproportionately important role in accommodating households living in poverty. It also shows that the odds of being income poor are the same for private tenants as for social housing tenants and three times higher than for owner-occupiers. It is concluded that, as a source of accommodation for low-income households, the role of the private rented sector is not residual at all. In addition, the paper assesses how well accommodated low-income households are in the PRS compared with non-poor private tenants and with low-income households in social housing and owner-occupation.

Employability and problem drug users

The New Labour government in Britain has introduced a major programme of welfare to work, known as the New Deal, which aims to help unemployed and economically inactive people into paid work. Although welfare to work programmes may be appropriate for those who are more or less job ready, it is less clear that they are suitable for hard-to-help groups with multiple disadvantages. This article draws on new survey evidence from Scotland to question the suitability of welfare to work for problem drug users. It demonstrates that many people using drug treatment services suffer from a range of serious personal, health, lifestyle, and other problems that would need to be addressed before they are in a position either to complete welfare to work programmes successfully or to take up and retain paid employment.

The revival of private rented housing in Britain

Abstract The paper examines private renting in Britain since 1988. It discusses the supply side response to rent deregulation, the temporary provision of tax incentives, and the property slump. The first section reviews the decline of private renting, its causes and implications. The second section describes the governments objective in reviving private renting, its methods and the wider context. The third section sets out some of the consequences of rent deregulation. The fourth section reviews evidence about the supply side of the private rented sector since deregulation, and the final section assesses the implications of the research findings for future policy.

Private Renting After the Global Financial Crisis

Analyses of the impact of the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) on housing have largely focused on subprime mortgages and homeownership. By contrast, the impact of the financial crisis on the private rented sector has received much less attention. This paper helps to address that gap by examining the impact of the GFC on private renting in Britain. In recent years, the private rented sector (PRS) in Britain has grown in size after many years of decline; and the formal rules and informal practices that characterize this tenure have also changed significantly. This transformation began during the 1990s but the pace of change increased from the turn of the century and accelerated still further during the GFC. Drawing on an historical institutional perspective, it shows that the changes to private renting over this period were shaped not only by domestic events but also by developments in the international political economy.

Employability trajectories among new claimants of Incapacity Benefit

The Employment and Support Allowance (ESA), which replaced incapacity-related benefits in the UK in October 2008, is predicated on the assumption that it will be a temporary benefit for the majority of people who claim it. Following an initial medical assessment, new ESA claimants are allocated to one of two groups. Those judged to have less severe or temporary conditions are allocated to the Work-related Activity Group and are required to take active steps to prepare for a return to employment. Meanwhile, people considered to be severely disabled are allocated to the Support Group and are not expected to undertake work-related activities. This article examines the implications of this new distinction between those claimants who potentially could do paid work and those for whom that outcome is much less likely. Drawing on baseline and follow-up surveys, the article examines the employment status trajectories of a cohort of new Incapacity Benefit (IB) claimants in the year following their claim. It examines three questions. First, who returns to work and what factors are associated with that outcome? Second, how employable are the people who do not return to work and does their employability change during the first year of their claim? And third, among those who remained on IB after a year, what distinguishes people who classify themselves as permanently unable to work from those who do not? The article concludes with a discussion of the main findings and their implications for policy.

The Role and Design of Income‐Related Housing Allowances

Income-related housing allowance schemes have become a long-term feature of social policy in the advanced welfare states. They are not without disadvantages, however, and a number of countries have recently introduced significant reforms of their systems. The aim of this paper is to examine some key features of, and recent developments in, housing allowance programmes in seven countries. It addresses five main questions: why have income-related housing allowances become so important, what role do they play, what are the essential features of such schemes, how do they tackle concerns about moral hazard, and what are the pressures facing them?

Contrasting Varieties of Private Renting: England and Germany

Abstract After many years of decline, the private rental sector has increased in England, but remains a relatively small part of the housing market. Free market rents and weak security of tenure are widely regarded by private landlords and policymakers in England as essential preconditions for a commercially viable private rental housing market to exist. And yet in Germany – which has a very large private rented sector – ‘soft’ rent regulation has been in place since 1971 and tenants have very strong security of tenure, conditions that in England would be seen as inimical to investment in the sector. The aim of this paper is to address this puzzle. It asks: how is it that free market rents and weak security of tenure are perceived to be vital ingredients for a successful private rental sector (PRS) in England, when neither exists in Germany, which has a very large PRS?

Housing vouchers in the United States, great Britain, and the Netherlands: Current issues and future perspectives

Abstract We compare the current U.S. housing voucher program with the British housing benefit and the Dutch housing allowance programs. After presenting the theory behind income‐related housing support, which underpins both the U.S. and European systems, we compare the three programs with respect to their scope (the budgeted versus the entitlement approach), the relationship between housing support and rent levels, the poverty trap, moral hazards, and administrative problems. The United States can learn from Great Britain and the Netherlands that a full entitlement program can best promote equity, but given the present political and economic climate, it is unlikely that Congress will adopt such a program anytime soon. Great Britain and the Netherlands can learn from the United States how to design a more efficient tenant subsidy program, one that provides incentives to find less expensive units and promotes family self‐sufficiency through enhanced job‐seeking behavior.

Researching Housing Management Performance

Since the mid 1980s there has been a growing interest in assessing housing management performance in the social housing sector. The Audit Commission, for example, has produced a number of reports on housing management (e.g. Audit Commission, 1986a ). The Department of the Environm ent (DoE) commissioned Glasgow University to undertake a comparative study of housing management in local authorities and housing associations in England (Maclennan et al., 1989). An equivalent study was commissioned by the Welsh Of® ce (Clinton et al., 1989). A study by the Accounts Commission and the Institute of Housing (1992) has also been published on housing management by local authorities in Scotland. More recently, the DoE commissioned York University to undertake a baseline study of housing management under the new ® nancial regimes in England (Bines et al., 1993). The management performance of housing cooperatives has also been examined in research commissioned by the DoE (Clapham and Satsangi, 1990). Clapham (1992) has compared the effectiveness of housing management by what he referred to as `mass landlords ’ (local authorities and large housing associations) with that of small-scale, locally based, resident controlled landlords such as cooperatives and community-ba sed housing associations. Research has also been conducted on the performance of local authorities on particular aspects of the housing management service. This includes work on rent arrears (Radford, 1980; Wilkinson, 1980; Audit Commission, 1984, 1989; Duncan and Kirby, 1983), repairs (Audit Commission, 1986b; Maclennan et al., 1986) and empty properties (Merrett and Smith, 1988). More generally, Clapham and Satsangi (1992) have discussed the issue of accountability in the context of performance assessment in housing management. They drew particular attention to the limited, `supermarket’ notion of consumerism often implicit in such assessment exercises and stressed the need for adequate consumer involvement in them. Smith and Walker (1994) have examined the use and pitfalls of performance indicators in housing management in Wales. And Walker (1994) sets out an approach to classifying housing associations for the purpose of measuring housing management performance (see also Bines, 1990). This emerging literature on housing management represents part of a much wider interest in performance evaluation within the public sector that has developed since the early 1980s. This has covered areas such as health, education, the police and social care. As Flynn (1986) has pointed out, measuring performance has become a central preoccupation in public-sector agencies. This trend should not be seen in isolation from other developments in the provision of welfare. It is part of a growing concern about the performance of the public sector. It is argued that whereas previously the central