Upload
others
View
5
Download
0
Embed Size (px)
Citation preview
Tackling the links between
housing and poverty
Tackling the links between housing and poverty
Chair: Jim Strang, Chief Executive, Parkhead HA and
CIH Governing Board Member
Jacquie Dale, Director of Housing and Community Services, JRHT
Kevin Dodd, CEO, Wakefield and District Housing
John Harris, Journalist and Author
Tackling the links between housing
and poverty
Jacquie Dale
Director of Housing & Community Services
Joseph Rowntree Foundation
Joseph Rowntree Housing Trust
JRF/JRHT
JRF - independent endowed policy and research
foundation
Spend approx. £10m per year on policy and research
JRHT - a small housing and care provider
Around 2,500 homes in York, Yorkshire and Hartlepool
JRF and JRHT: Our work programmes and aims
PO
VE
RT
Y Our aim:
To identify the
root causes of
poverty and
injustice
PL
AC
E Our aim:
To support
resilient
communities
where people
thrive
AN
AG
EIN
G
SO
CIE
TY
Our aim:
To respond
positively to the
opportunities
and challenges
of an ageing
society
Joseph Rowntree Foundation and
Joseph Rowntree Housing Trust
search
demonstrate
influence
What we do
What do we mean by poverty?
The big picture on poverty
What it looks and feels like for people in the communities where we work
Around a fifth of the UK population experience poverty in a given year
6.1 million people in poverty are in working households
The Links Between Housing and Poverty
An extra 3 million people would be classed as in poverty
if we measured poverty after housing costs
The poverty rate would double in London
We would also add a million more to the child poverty rate
Problematic Debt
Benefits getting even tighter
Low pay, no pay cycle
4.4 million jobs pay less than £7 per hour
£20 billion cut to the social security budget by 2015–16
Developing an Anti-Poverty Strategy
Becoming an anti-poverty landlord
Becoming an anti-poverty employer
Developing an anti-poverty strategy for the UK
Being an anti-poverty communicator
Becoming an Anti-Poverty Landlord
Working with residents on case-by-case basis
Financial inclusion and benefits advice
Pay
Affordable credit
Poverty test for JRHT policies
Becoming an Anti-Poverty Employer
Money management and real help with debt
Job Progression
Pay and rewards - the Living Wage
Paid internships
Developing an Anti-Poverty Strategy for the UK
Our outputs to inform national and local anti-poverty
strategies
Encourage a debate - what would low-poverty UK would
really be like?
Aim to assess and strengthen the political consensus on
how to reduce poverty
Tackling Housing Poverty
Four year research and development programme: to improve the housing offer for those experiencing poverty,
regardless of tenure
Working with NHF– how can we build more affordable homes?
Working with Crisis to produce the Homelessness Monitor
Housing and Migration: The housing and migration network
The housing and migration: a UK guide to issues and solutions
Does housing have a role in alleviating poverty?
Challenge policy
Create our own solutions
Sharing our solutions
Links at www.jrf.org.uk
Anti-poverty strategies for the UK
The links between housing and poverty
Monitoring poverty and social exclusion
A minimum income standard for the UK
The Housing and Migration Network
www.jrf.org.uk
@jrf_uk
@theJRHT
@jacquiedale
JosephRowntreeFoundation
Tackling the links between
housing and poverty
Kevin Dodd
CEO, Wakefield and
District Housing
delivering promises, improving lives
Challenges of
Welfare Reform Kevin Dodd
Chief Executive
Wakefield and District Housing
delivering promises, improving lives
People Property Place
delivering promises, improving lives
Where is Wakefield?
delivering promises, improving lives
Challenges in Wakefield • Wakefield is the 67th most deprived district in England.
• 12.5% population live in deprived neighbourhoods.
• 9,500 people seeking work.
• 13,500 children under 16 live in households claiming benefits.
• 21% of children in live in poverty, rising to 50% in some areas.
• 28.6% of households are fuel poor, compared to 18%
nationally.
delivering promises, improving lives
delivering promises, improving lives
Rent
delivering promises, improving lives
Build
delivering promises, improving lives
Added Value …
delivering promises, improving lives
For tenants to have
the choice!
Why did WDH want to be
involved in the Demonstration
Project?
delivering promises, improving lives
Cognitive Dissonance –
The Conversation! • Governments View - people are rational beings.
• Housing View - change a person’s beliefs to change
their behaviour.
• Governments View - reframing - help to
re-examine beliefs and develop healthier ways of viewing
the situation.
delivering promises, improving lives
The Stroop Effect Blue Red Green Yellow Black
Orange Pink Violet Blue Black Red
Orange Pink Green Yellow Blue Red
Green Blue Red Black Orange Pink
Violet Orange Green Pink Yellow
Green Orange Blue Red Black Blue
Orange Pink Green Blue Red Black
delivering promises, improving lives
WDH’s Income Profile • £54m – Pensioners
• £75m – Working Age Tenants
- £30m – Low Income Household
- £45m – Housing Benefit
£129m – Annual Rent
delivering promises, improving lives
Impact of Universal Credit
• £45m – Housing Benefit
• £6m – Under Occupancy
• £30m – Low Income
£81m – At Risk
delivering promises, improving lives
Universal Credit Transition
delivering promises, improving lives
Too Early To Tell…..!
• Voids: + 22%.
• Increase by 25% in mutual exchanges.
• 42% increase, 2 / 3 bedroom properties.
• Former tenants arrears increased.
• Bids for 3 bedroom properties dropped by 40%.
delivering promises, improving lives
Demonstration Project…..! • 94% payment rate!
• Approximately 50% of tenants are using Direct Debit.
• Average debt £180 per tenant.
• 229 tenants have reverted back.
• No evictions.
• Admin costs £250+ tenant.
delivering promises, improving lives
Responsibilities!
delivering promises, improving lives
Case Studies
+
-
delivering promises, improving lives
The Sting…Bedroom Tax +…!
• 340 in project affected by Bedroom Tax.
• + £5.5k Bedroom and Council Tax.
• Demonstration Project more likely to fail.
• Benefit cap to come!
delivering promises, improving lives
Projected Debt…!
delivering promises, improving lives
=
Reduced Income
Universal Credit Equation
Arrears Cost of
Collection Bank
Charges
Cost of
Admin
Cost of
Cash Flow
x 20,000
+ + + +
+ Bedroom Tax
=
Viability
delivering promises, improving lives
Viability
delivering promises, improving lives
The Millennium Year …
delivering promises, improving lives
Housing Pays!
People
Year
delivering promises, improving lives
delivering promises, improving lives
Income vs
Expenditure
The Game Plan!
Tackling the links between
housing and poverty
John Harris
Journalist and Author
Poverty, social security and welfare reform
John Harris, Summer 2013
• “Well, sorry you can’t feed your kids, and youth services where you live have been cut by 100%, but you should have a look at these really exciting plans for a couple of new airports and the widening of the M4.”
•MORALITY
• ECONOMICS
• Retailers, small businesses, large corporations, city councils and the exchequer are all skint. They desperately need goods moving from shelves, shops restocking, banks lending against renewed cash flow, employment growing and taxes being paid.
• There is no shortage of ideas for this, long rehearsed in this column. They range from boosting social benefits for a year to temporary tax reliefs, scrappage schemes and time-limited spending vouchers. Given present unemployment and spare capacity it is inconceivable that such an injection would be inflationary.
• The Bank of England could print £500 per head in notes and dump them in every private bank account in the land for less than it has given its banking friends. It would be the quickest way of injecting cash into the veins of the economy "off balance sheet".
• There is an alternative.
• 64% of us believe that the benefits system either doesn’t work or is “failing” (ComRes, 2012).
• 40% of people think that all benefit recipients are scroungers (ComRes, 2012).
• Only 20% of people under 34 think the welfare state is one of Britain’s proudest creations (Ipsos Mori, 2013)
• Nearly half of them think that if you’re on benefits, it’s down to laziness rather than bad luck (Ipsos Mori, 2013).
• Is government doing enough to offset effective benefit cuts with positive and proactive measures to challenge cultures of worklessness and support training and employment opportunities?
• No.
• “They didn’t have many ideas. They didn’t come up with any solutions apart from, ‘Look on the internet, look at jobs that are advertised, and apply for them.’”
• “They basically put you in a room with about 12 other people, sat you in front of a computer and said, ‘You’ve got an hour to find five jobs.’”
• Judge’s last job before becoming unemployed was as a hotel barman, and he says that when A4e staff pointed him towards particular parts of the local job market, it was “always in the same areas: bars or hotels. It was never expanded.” Instead, after a job offer from a friend, he borrowed £1500 from his parents and gained a coach driver’s license, leading to him starting work.
Tackling the links between
housing and poverty