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Intention and Implication in Housing Policy: A study of Recent Developments in Urban Renewal1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2009

Tim Mason
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Abstract

This paper considers the explicit intentions and possible implications of the new phase of urban renewal policy now being developed in Britain under the Housing Act 1974. The details of the Act are seen in the context of the evolution of this type of social policy since the last war. The aims of this policy are to preserve certain ‘housing functions’ that are considered to be necessary components of the urban housing system, at the same time as relieving ‘housing stress’ and achieving the physical improvement of existing dwellings. A case study of an inner city improvement area in a provincial conurbation is used to suggest that it will be difficult to achieve all these aims at one time due to the inherent limitations of policies based on small areas. These limitations are seen as the consequence of a continuing effort to patch up the obvious shortcomings of existing policies without wishing to face the political and economic problems of a comprehensive housing policy.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Social Policy , Volume 6 , Issue 1 , January 1977 , pp. 17 - 30
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1977

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References

2 In particular parts IV and VI of the Housing Act 1974 and Part II of the Housing (Scotland) Act 1974.

3 For more detailed studies of the development of British improvement policy see: Duncan, T. L. C., ‘Housing Improvement Policies in England and Wales’, Centre for Urban and Regional Studies, University of Birmingham, Research Memo No. 28, January 1974Google Scholar, and Spencer, K., ‘Older Urban Areas and Housing Improvement Policies’, Town Planning Review, 1970, vol. 41, pp. 250–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

4 Housing and Construction Statistics, Department of Environment, 1st quarter 1975, no. 13.Google Scholar

5 MrChannon, Paul, Second Reading of the Housing Amendment Bill, Hansard, 27 Nov., 1972, c. 157–8.Google Scholar

6 Department of the Environment, Better Homes the Next Priorities, Cmnd. 5339, London: HMSO, 1973, p. 4, §17.Google Scholar

7 Three proposals in the original White Paper were left out of the Conservatives' Housing and Planning Bill, and the almost identical Labour version of the same Bill which became the Housing Act 1974. These proposals were: a requirement that landlords selling rented property in HAAs offer the property first to a local council or housing association; to allow local councils to nominate tenants to empty accommodation if landlords appeared not to be filling it; to place a duty on local councils to rehouse any tenants displaced by rehabilitation.

8 Department of Environment, ‘Housing Act 1974: Parts IV, V, VI; Housing Action Areas, Priority Neighbourhoods and General Improvement Areas’, Circular 14/75.Google Scholar

9 Manchester City Council, Housing Policies and Resources Report, September 1974.Google Scholar

10 Declared August 1975.

11 Circular 14/75, op. cit.

12 This survey is part of a wider study financed by the Centre for Environmental Studies in London and also sponsored by the Sociology Department of Manchester University. The 65 interviews were taken from 52 houses, making a sample of approximately 1 in 2.5 houses. An attempt was always made to interview the ‘head’ of the household, i.e. the main wage earner or equivalent; in most cases this would be the husband. In cases where it proved impossible to interview the head, either because they were unwilling or un obtainable, another adult member of the household was interviewed; in practice, this was the wife. Often husband and wife were interviewed together. The positive response rate was 67 per cent, 27 per cent being refusals, 10 per cent non-contacts and 2 per cent empty houses. All percentages are rounded to the nearest whole number.

13 Defined as the proportion of households at an occupancy rate of 1.5 persons or more per room, counting children of 10 years or under as ½ person and counting only those rooms not shared with other households and excluding bathrooms, toilet, hallway and kitchen, unless the kitchen was used for other than just cooking purposes.

14 Op. cit., para. 44.

15 Tenth Report of the Expenditure Committee, House Improvement Grants, House of Commons Paper 349, Session 1972–1973, vol. I, para. 55.Google Scholar

16 See Cullingworth, J. B., Housing in Transition, London: Heinemann, 1963Google Scholar, for a study of landlords in Lancaster; Greve, J., Private Landlords in Great Britain, Occasional Papers on Social Administration No. 16, London: Bell, 1965Google Scholar, for the only national study ever carried out; Elliott, B. A. and McCrone, D., ‘Property Relations in the City: The Fortunes of Landlordism’, paper given at the Centre for Environmental Studies Conference on Urban Sociology, York University, 7–10 January 1975Google Scholar, for an on-going study of landlordism in Edinburgh.

17 Davies, J. G. and Taylor, , ‘Race, Community and No Conflict’, New Society, 9 07 1970. vol. 16Google Scholar, on the position of Asian landlords in Rye Hill, Newcastle-on-Tyne.

18 There are an estimated 50,000 privately rented properties in the city and the £5 million allocated by the Manchester Corporation District Council, in the estimates for 1975–6, for the buying up of such property will cover only 1,000 houses. See Morris, Michael, ‘Landlords Get Notice to Quit’, Guardian, 12 November 1974.Google Scholar

19 New Earnings Survey, 1974 (London: HMSO, 1975)Google Scholar, Part E, Table 108, gives average gross weekly earnings for full-time manual workers in Greater Manchester as £41.90 in April 1974.

20 Circular 14/75, op. cit., para. 42.

21 Holtermann, Sally, ‘Areas of Urban Deprivation in Great Britain: An Analysis of 1971 Census Data’, Social Trends, No. 6, London: HMSO, 1975, pp. 33–47.Google Scholar

22 For a discussion of how resources could be directed to households in need rather than to all those in a particular small area, see Graham, P., ‘Are Action Areas a Mistake?’, Municipal and Public Services Journal, vol. 82, no. 27, 07 1974, pp. 809–11.Google Scholar

23 Department of Environment, Housing Needs and Action, Circular 24/75.Google Scholar

24 Public Expenditure to 1978–9, Cmnd. 5879, London: HMSO, 1975, Table 27.Google Scholar

25 Government Observations on 10th Report of Expenditure Committee, Cmnd. 5529, London: HMSO, 1974.Google Scholar

26 Department of Environment, Housing Act 1974: Renewal Strategies, Circular 13/75.Google Scholar

27 Pickup, David, ‘Housing Action Areas: The Provision of the Housing Act, 1974’. Housing Review, vol. 24, no. 2.Google Scholar

28 Glennerster, Howard and Hatch, Stephen (eds), Positive Discrimination and Inequality, Fabian Research Series 314, 1974.Google Scholar

29 Eversley, D. (‘The Landlord's Slow Farewell’, New Society, 16 01 1975, vol. 31, no. 641)Google Scholar describes the continuing but slowing decline of the privately rented sector.

30 Townsend, Peter, ‘Everyone his own home, equality in housing and the creation of a national service’, Journal of the Royal Institute of British Architects, 01 1973, vol. 80Google Scholar; and Nevitt, A. A., Fair Deal for Householders, Fabian Research Series No. 297, 1971Google Scholar. Both these argue for specific reforms to equalize housing subsidy between tenures in order to improve the worst conditions.