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Among the many knee jerks following the riots is the proposal that those convicted of rioting offences may be evicted from council housing.
Cameron backs plans to ensure that council tenants found guilty of taking part in the mayhem will be evicted. Ministers are re-drafting consultation documents to ensure that councils get those powers. The Housing Minister, Grant Shapps, was tightening the law to make sure that even if a rioter was convicted of a crime outside their borough they could lose their council home, something that is not possible at the moment. ”Criminal or anti-social behaviour in the local neighbourhood by a tenant or a member of their family can provide grounds for eviction,” he said. ”The government is looking to strengthen those powers and so anyone involved in the unrest should stop and think about the long-term impact that their actions will have on the rest of their lives.”
David Cameron told MPs it “should be possible to evict them and keep them evicted”. He said: “Parents have a responsibility to control the young people living in their home. If young people living in your home have been involved in the violence over the past few days, they are putting your tenancy at risk.”
Some sensibly pointed out that it would mean moving problem social-housing tenants to different areas, but there is a much deeper issue involved here. The whole idea of social housing is wrong and local government certainly should not own or let housing. However much you might try to avoid it, being a council tenant is stigmatising. Being is social housing labels people in a way that depresses expectations and and diminishes the chances of social mobility.
It will be said by some that housing is a fundamental right and it is necessary to subsidise the housing needs of poor people. Well food and clothing are just as essential needs, but not many people would say that the state should produce these needs. The truth is that the state is a very bad landlord and there is no more reason that they should be in that business than that they should be making jeans or baking bread.
There is very strong competition and highly efficient supply of functional clothing and basic food. Contrast that with long housing waiting lists, poor maintenance standards and enormous tax burden in the provision of council housing. What is required is for all housing to be privately owned and available in the same market irrespective of whether you are wealthy or poor. Supply will then meet demand, subject to it not being distorted by stupid planning laws, and people will be able to buy or rent accommodation that is suited to their means and needs.
Another aspect of the eviction proposal is the collective punishment involved. Stalin used to send the families of his political opponents to Siberia after he had shot the main irritant. This was generally regarded in the west as being a bit unfair, but it seems that we are happy with the principle. Is it really right that a woman and children could be put out onto the street because the man of a house is a looter. Not in my view.
We need clarity and to remain rational. It can be no part of a civilised justice system for a person and their family to be thrown out of their home as punishment for a crime unrelated to their use of that home. The state would not get into this muddled thinking if it understood its proper role and left housing to the the citizens who own and live in them.
Related articles
- Councils set to evict rioters (independent.co.uk)
- Evict the Rioters? (redbrickblog.wordpress.com)
Hoping to read this and find something with which to disagree but your reaction is absolutely correct.
Two wrongs don’t make a right and when the government tries to make them so for reasons of populism all they demonstrate is lack of principle.
How am I supposed to stop my teenage children going out and doing as they wish? Should I use violence and lock them up?
I thought that was against the law………..
Sorry, there is nothing on this blog which anybody could possibly disagree with.
The problem is one that does not really need solving, I think.
It exists because false and untrue considerations have warped reality.
As you say, the state should not really be in the rental business in the first place.
But the riots themselves would not have happened if the whole situation had not been set up by a wilful distortion of reality.
I don’t think one can just “fix” the problem. But, given people of goodwill, one could move towards reducing the problem. Much as one could reduce the vast organs of the state without causing any harm, were the powers-that-be so inclined.
But they aren’t, of course. No one likes to reduce their power base.
That is the problem.
As long as one looking for solutions to be delivered by those whose very raison-d’etre is based on the problem, I don’t think there are going to be many genuine and lasting happy outcomes.
Reagan was quite good as a politician because he understood he was part of the problem.
He said the most feared words in English should be: “I’m from the government and I’m here to help you.”
I agree JB. Looking to the government to reduce itself is a fantasy, but that the extent of government interference needs to be reduced is commonly agreed among most who come to this site.
The only answer is that the state must be brought to recognise that it must give way to the demands of citizens for less interference in their lives, less of their earnings being taken away from them and more influence over the running of their own communities.
It is in this last element that we can see signs of hope. The Scots now have a parliament and they are gradually increasing the extent of control they have over their affairs. The Welsh Assembly is in existence and its very limited influence is being extended. Similarly for northern Ireland. In none of these cases are there less intrusive administrations, the opposite is more true, but the point I am making here is that some control can be wrested from central government.
These are small, but very significant clawbacks of centralisation after generations of attempted standardisation of the union. The Cornish have started to demand some recognition of their separate identity and other English regions hanker for greater scope to express their cultural distinction and specific economic needs.
Here on the Wirral we are a peninsula with all the natural, economic and political potential to do better than Singapore, Monaco, Lichtenstein, Andorra or the Isle of Man. We may be a small voice, but we intend to be an irresistible one and when combined with that of Yorkshire, Cornwall and others our voice will be heard.
Wirral vs Andorra in the World Cup Qualifiers – who’s your money on?
Presumably the peninsula will have its own cricket team as well? I’d take them to beat India on current form!!
Being a free and open society the Wirral will have just as many sporting teams of any type as it likes. As they will undoubtedly be of outstanding quality due to the prosperous and pleasant environment in which they exist, most attention will probably be on Hoylake v Birkenhead North after they have defeated Andorra in the early stages.
The shortsightedness of the Human Rights Law which the Blairs of the UK championed is to blame for the rioters’ morals, or lack thereof.