Guaranteed Rent | The realities of Margaret Thatcher’s property-owning democracy
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One significant plank of Thatcherite privatisation was in the housing market, by championing free-market consumerism at the cost of planned social housing (Letters, 11 April). The current economics of this principle make stark reading. Last year £23bn was paid out in housing benefit; £9.2bn of this public money was paid directly into the pockets of private-sector landlords charging market-determined (one might argue exploitative or extortionate) rents. Social-rented sector tenants receive on average £81 per week while private-sector tenants receive on average £106 per week. Public-sector funding is propping up private-sector landlords, and one wonders how “good” the private sector would be without this public funding.Guaranteed Rent
Another significant plank was deregulating employment laws to encourage our public-spirited entrepreneurs to generate greater employment opportunities. Last year £21bn was paid out in tax credits to in-work families. It can be estimated that £17bn has been paid to those employed in the private sector. Yet another example of the public purse subsidising private-sector greed. That’s 81% of public funding of this kind being given to families to whom the private sector can’t pay a living wage yet can make profits for shareholders and company owners.
Using the government’s own statistics, it appears that Thatcher’s much-lauded property and shareholding democracy is being propped up by governments of all hues spending current and future public money to private-sector individuals and institutions to maintain them in a state of profit and lack of risk.
Paul Barrow
London Guaranteed Rent
• The sale of council housing was indeed divisive and had a catastrophic effect on housing supply; but the policy took advantage of the fact that people instinctively value certainty and have a profound sense of identity and place. Margaret Thatcher reaped many rewards as a result of recognising the importance of this. Ironically, the current government, so keen to see itself as the inheritor of the Thatcher mantle, has no understanding of this (or at least not in the case of the poor). Long-term tenancy agreements will become a thing of the past, “under-occupancy” and the bedroom tax will punish those going through the transitions of family life, and caps on housing benefit will keep the poor rootless and in a state of perpetual impermanence, with the inevitable damage to individuals and communities.
Gillian Dalley
London
• The truth surely is that Margaret Thatcher hated the very socialist idea of subsidised social housing. She not only forbade councils using capital receipts from the sales to build new housing, but similarly refused to allow that money to be spent on repairs to existing stock.
Does no one remember Housing Action Trusts? This was a cynical device to encourage private-sector landlords to take over councils’ housing stock, and to encourage tenants to opt for this as the only means of raising money to improve their rundown buildings. Fortunately, tenants, many of whom had vivid memories of Rachmanism, overwhelming voted against the idea. I remain convinced that Thatcher’s prime motive was to destroy council housing, a mission almost accomplished.
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