That made you click didn't it? Sorry to disappoint (another bedroom reference there for your delectation), but this is a brief (there I go again) piece (ahem) about the so-called Bedroom tax or 'spare room supplement' being proposed by our great leaders and masters at this time.
Now by instinct I'm slightly to the right of Attilla the Hun, but I have some serious misgivings about this policy.
Firstly let's just clear up the fact that this was a policy mooted by Labour and they would have brought forward legislation on exactly this issue had the electorate been stupid enough to vote them in again last time, instead of just almost doing so. (Go figure).
Because, you may not have noticed yet, but the politicians we vote for and elect, are allowed to put forward some suggestions and shout loudly from time to time, but it's Whitehall, and unelected Civil Servants who actually decide on policy and keep the whole machinery of Government rumbling on.
So Labour, like the Coalition, understood the principle that houses with more bedrooms cost more money and that, therefore, people who live in social rented accommodation (council houses to you and me) should have a clear need for the number of bedrooms in the house in order to qualify for that size of property. And single people living in three bedroomed homes while families with children live in one-bedroom homes, particularly when all of it is paid for by the state (for 'state' read 'taxpayer') is just plain wrong.
And that's fine, it makes sense and in a world where, for the past 50 years we'd been building anything like the number of new homes (including social rented or 'affordable' as they're sometimes, misleadingly described) needed to meet demand (with more people living alone, people living independently into older age, family breakdown, growing population etc), this would be workable.
But we haven't. The Labour caveat to the (let's call it, for simplicity) bedroom tax, was that it would only be levied if tenants had been offered and refused a suitable alternative. Now we can argue about what 'suitable' means til the cows come home, but let's just say somewhere with more or fewer bedrooms depending upon the size of their family, taking account of any disabilities etc, within the same post-code, for the sake of argument.
And I agree with that. If said alternative is available, has been offered and declined, then the charge (and by 'charge' I mean whatever 'penalty' is being put forward) should be made.
But just charging people for where they've ended up (kids left home etc) without them knowing it was going to happen so they could downsize (just as one could or would in the private housing sector) and if alternative provision were available, is draconian in my opinion. I understand about comparisons between public and private sector provision and this system should be imposed for all new tenants, but the problem of lack of provision, as previously described, means that there is very rarely a suitable alternative open to the tenants concerned. Which means that many of them have no choice but to accept this penalty. Which, to my mind, is akin to charging people for the air that they breathe. If they have no choice about it, it is a backwards, draconian and completely unfair step in my opinion and what's more it is an unworkable game of musical chairs which will inevitably hit the worst off in society the most.
I'm all for breaking the welfare trap that has people almost stuck in a life on benefits: I see strong evidence of this close to where I live where, for many 14 and 15 year old girls, 'starting a family' is seen (and I'm deadly serious about this) as a career option, in that it comes with housing, child benefit etc and is 'liveable'. So I do believe the balance has to be changed as IDS is trying to do, to encourage people to work and to get on. But this particular measure is badly drafted, badly thought-through, unworkable and unfair.
Anyway, following the start of this blog, it seems I'm in the spare room anyway for the foreseeable future. ;) Thanks for reading.
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