Council / money owed / careful who you vote for?

[Roundabout]

Council / money owed / careful who you vote for?

FOI requests recently:

Council tax arrears @ 23/02/2014 - Almost 8 mil ? [?7,960582.95p]

Rent arrears @ January this year ? just over ?16 million.

[Loz]

WTF?

[PokerTime]

And how much of those arrears are due to the coalition induced bedroom tax?????

Do I really need to post figures????

[Loz]

Do you have figures from a reputable source for Southwark for that? How do you distinguish that criterion?

[aquarius moon]

We've been here before Roundabout.

I see you didn't take ratty's good advice then.

[PokerTime]

There ya go......an increase of tenants in arrears from 25% to 60% thanks to *drum roll*......BEDROOM TAX.....ta-dah!!!!

http://www.insidehousing.co.uk/southwark-to-take-1m-from-housing-budget-to-help-bedroom-tax-victims/6528795.article

Geez...must do better if you really want to suggest that both Con and Lib Dem are a better alternative to Labour (who have pledged to abolish said tax in a General Election) on the eve of a local election....

[Loz]

PT - you are usually better with figures than that. The articles says "as a result of central government?s welfare reforms", which would include all changes to HB, etc, not just those associated with those having excess bedrooms.

[PokerTime]

I do remember posting on another thread more detailed stats on this. I think it was a general housing debate. I will try and find those stats. There is no doubt that bedroom tax has impacted massively on arrears. But I'll find the accurate figures to support that.

Edited to add; 'Inside Housing' I have found to be reliable source of stats analysis during my research into a current project on Housing issues (now spanning a year of detailed research). we all rely on DWP published figures as a starting point, and look at poor individual management as a variable factor. The vast majority of people affected, are people who want to downsize, but the local authority has nowhere to downsize them to.

[Roundabout]

Those not concerned about monies owed to the Council / Of course can?t ever again complain about lack of services being provided / Or can they?

[Loz]

Roundabout Wrote:

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> Those not concerned about monies owed to the Council / Of course can?t ever again complain

> about lack of services being provided / Or can they?

Pretty much every council ever has been crap with nailing down arrears for both rent and council tax.

[PokerTime]

Also, rent arrears only affect the Housing Revenue Account. It's not a measure of delivery of other council services.

Southwark is one of the biggest social housing providers in the capital and the country. ?8 million, whilst no small sum in itself, is also diminished proportionately whithin the realm of it's size. If we accept that 59% of those arrears (approx) are down to coalition reforms on Housing Benefit, then we are looking at a real figure of ?3.2 million.

Currently HB pays directly to the council. And some tenants are required to pay a supplement in addition (depending on circumstances). Things will get worse when Universal Payment is rolled out.

[PokerTime]

But Loz....most of those arrears are dealing with people at the bottom of the ladder, some of whom have mental health issues and so on. That's where these people end up, under the wing of local authority provision. Considering that Southwark is such a huge social housing provider, arrears are actually a small farction of it's HA account revenue.

[Loz]

PokerTime Wrote:

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> But Loz....most of those arrears are dealing with people at the bottom of the ladder, some of whom

> have mental health issues and so on. That's where these people end up, under the wing of local

> authority provision. Considering that Southwark is such a huge social housing provider, arrears are

> actually a small farction of it's HA account revenue.

But how can 60% of tenants in arrears be 'a small fraction'?

[PokerTime]

It's not but there has to be some understanding of why that is. 40% of council tenants in properties affected by bedroom tax. What is a local authority to do if they don't have smaller proporties to move them into? This is the major flaw of bedroom tax! Sure you can move them into smaller but private rented sector properties, but do you have any idea of the additional cost to the HB bill? And add to that, that because of HB reform the number of private rented sector landlords prepared to rent to HB claimants has shrunk remarkably. It's not the impact the government expected. I can't think of a more ill thought out policy by central government.

Here's a stark example of what I'm talking about. In my documentary I compare a local authority called Sefton to London. It would take Sefton council 15 years to rehouse all the single people in two bedroom properties (on HB ) according to the number of one bedroomed properties that become available every year. What is an LA like that supposed to do?

This is a sanction that took into no account, underoccupancy vs available social housing stock. It doesn't matter what side of the fence you sit politically, from a fiscal viewpoint, the lack of research and shaping of policy as a result, makes no sense, unless you apply an idealogy (of bashing the poorest).

Edited to add; Loz I think you are an intelligent poster. I am more than happy to explain to you the impact of bedroom tax (or HB reform). You can't punish people at the bottom of the ladder with no equally affordable alternative to escape to. Bedroom tax ONLY affects people in social housing. There are many recorded cases of people who should be exempt (like the disabled and those in low paid jobs) being affected. The DWP is currently in a mess...and it can take more than year for the poor claimant trying to sort it out to get anywhere.

[PokerTime]

From southwarks own figures, there are 55,000 social properties in Southwark. Of those properties, approx 40,000 are tenanted and the rest leasehold.

Here is a very good document that highlights the demography of Southwarks Housing Stock. The report was chaired by the very capable Gavin Edwards, with cross party support.

http://moderngov.southwark.gov.uk/documents/s32592/Appendix%201%20Investing%20in%20Council%20Housing.pdf

It states that;

Two-thirds of current tenants are not economically active. Many are pensioners and carers.

and that....

The incomes of council tenants are low, with 70% on incomes below ?20,000. The median income is ?9,100, far below the borough average and five times less than that of home owners.

It's not hard to see why, with welfare reforms, some 40% of tenants have encountered difficulty. Who in their right mind, would point to this, and claim that council incompetance is to blame?

People have to be housed somewhere - including the low paid and unemployed. Most of them arrive at social housing (for many credible reasons). But of course, we've been fed a media onslaught of capable scroungers and employed people taking advantage of cheap housing. You know what? Thanks to the internet, it takes minutes to find the truth behind the soundbites. The internet is full of easily accessible (and highly credible) sources of data and figures. I just wish people would find the time to find out for themselves before posting the nonsense the OP has.

[Roundabout]

FOI request to Southwark Council. ?8 mil relates to 41,959 households. Would I be right to assume ? All those in Council tax and rent arrears - Don?t use the library ? pay for their own rubbish to be removed privately ? sweep in front of their house or flat ? ask for street lighting to be turned off and leave supermarkets with food without paying?

[PokerTime]

Have you read any of the posts above roundabout?

Firstly, money is not used from the Housing Revenue Account to pay for public services. Funding for those comes from Council Tax and central government. So rent arrears are completely irrelevant in respect to those things.

60% of those in arrears are in arrears because of Bedroom Tax - a welfare reform that Labour have pedged to abolish because of the harm it has done. The council have no smaller properties to move those people into. What would be your solution then?

And btw there are only 40,000 households (the rest being leaseholders) and those arrears apply to 24,000 of them.

[StraferJack]

is "in arrears" the same as "never paid"?

this is just intolerant, green-ink, nothing better to do nonsense

with corporations not paying bazillions in tax, you want to target some poor sod with no money and prevent them from using a library?

Ugly thinking

[PokerTime]

Exactly SJ. Many of those affected by Bedroom Tax have never been in arrears before. It's been a huge problem for Local Authorities everywhere.

[uncleglen]

Rent Arrears in 1999 26 million

http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm199900/cmhansrd/vo991208/halltext/91208h05.htm

(scroll down a bit 8th December)

[Otta]

Roundabout, what's the solution?

[uncleglen]

About 15 years ago I had a conversation with a Southwark Housing Officer and she said that they take tenants in arrears to court and then there is an agreement made for them to pay back their arrears and for most of them that are on benefits, the repayment amounted to about ?2 a week! I don't know if the same formula is applied today but if it is well....things can only get worse.

[PokerTime]

First of all, magistrates only evict people as a last resort. In most cases, the magistrate issues a suspended possession order with a fixed repayment plan. That repayment plan will always take into account a person means, so yes, someone on a low income would be given a longer term to clear the arrears.

I don't know what you want to see happen Uncleglen. Given that most tenants are in arrears through no real fault of their own, and that in most cases the arrears can be sorted out over time, making people homeless doesn't seem to be the answer (which is why magistrates only do it as a last resort).