Housing News Digest
Housing News Digest
The Tenants' Union Housing News Digest compiles our pick of items from all the latest tenancy and housing media, sent once per week, on Thursdays.
Below is the Digest archive from November 2020 onwards. From time to time you will find additional items in the archive that did not make it into the weekly Digest email. Earlier archives are here, where you can also find additional digests by other organisations.
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Archive
When it comes to Australia’s homelessness deaths, we can’t change what we don’t measure
Lisa Wood The Guardian (No paywall)If you are reading this in Australia, your odds of living to the ripe old age of 81 are good, as that is now the average age of death in the country. Australia now has the third highest life expectancy globally. But this average masks a sobering three-decade gap in life expectancy for people who have experienced homelessness.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/commentisfree/2024/fe…
# Must read Australia, Discrimination.I Hate Landlords. How Do I Avoid Becoming One?
Sophie K Rosa Novara Media (No paywall)“I’m an only child and a nephew of aunts and uncles with no children. I’m also a committed socialist who might end up owning multiple homes. What’s the most ethical way to deal with this dilemma? I can admit to a fearful and precarious instinct against selling them, but I loathe the idea of becoming a landlord like the parasites I rail against.” – Reluctant Landlord
https://novaramedia.com/2024/01/17/i-hate-landlords-how-do-i-avo…
# Hot topic International, .What if public housing were for everyone?
Rachel M. Cohen Vox (No paywall)Quietly and with little fanfare, the idea of building new publicly owned housing for people across the income spectrum has advanced in the United States. Governments have successfully addressed housing shortages through publicly developed housing in places like Vienna, Finland, and Singapore in the past, but these examples have typically inspired little attention in the US — which has more restrictive welfare policies and a bias toward private homeownership.
https://www.vox.com/policy/2024/2/10/24065342/social-housing-pub…
# Must read, Hot topic International, Public and community housing.Renters in England face rising no-fault evictions as reform bill delayed again
Robert Booth The Guardian (No paywall)Private renters in England were hit by a triple whammy of bad news on Thursday as official figures showed soaring no-fault evictions, a net loss of more than 16,000 homes for social rent and a fresh delay to long-promised laws to give renters greater security. The number of households evicted by bailiffs as a result of no-fault evictions rose 39% in 2023 compared with 2022, according to analysis by the housing charity Shelter of new Ministry of Justice figures. Rent campaigners said it showed a worsening trend “blighting the lives of renters across our country”.
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2024/feb/08/renters-in-engla…
# Hot topic International, Eviction, Rent.Private tenants in Scotland ‘face big rent rises and mass evictions’ from April
Libby Brooks The Guardian (No paywall)Private tenants in Scotland are facing big rent rises and mass evictions as emergency protections expire at the end of next month, campaigners have warned. The Scottish government has “in effect rubber-stamped rent increases from April”, says Ruth Gilbert, the national campaigns chair of the Scotland-wide tenants’ union Living Rent, while transitional measures are inadequate and confusing, leaving many unaware what their legal rights are.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/feb/11/tenants-scotland…
# Hot topic International, Eviction.Renters will still face unfair evictions under 'inadequate' new bill, say campaigners
Harry Farley BBC (No paywall)England: Campaigners have warned the government's plans to ban no-fault evictions in England are "inadequate". A group of charities have written to Housing Secretary Michael Gove urging him to strengthen legislation making its way through Parliament. Without changes, they said renters would continue to be unfairly threatened with losing their homes. The government said the bill would deliver "a fairer private rented sector for both tenants and landlords".
# Hot topic International, Eviction, Rent.The private sector housing experiment has failed: Ottawa must now step up on social housing
Shauna MacKinnon The Conversation (No paywall)Canada: Politicians of all stripes say that housing affordability is a top priority. But few are saying much about social housing — the kind that’s needed for low-income households in greatest need of affordable rental housing. Social housing is non-market housing, either publicly owned or non-profit, and substantially subsidized to ensure low-income renter households pay no more than 30 per cent of their gross income on rent. Canada was committed to this kind of housing after the Great Depression, but began to step away from it in the early 1990s.
https://theconversation.com/the-private-sector-housing-experimen…
# Hot topic International, Public and community housing.Europe’s housing crisis: Portugal, Turkey, and Luxembourg struggle to find solutions
Joanna Adhem & AFP Euro News (No paywall)Over recent years, housing crises have become increasingly prevalent across Europe, affecting nations of varying economic health. Portugal, Turkey, and even wealthy Luxembourg are grappling with the common challenge of providing affordable and accessible housing for their citizens. Portugal's youth homeownership plunge: In Portugal, the homeownership rate among young people has plummeted by 50% over two generations. While 55% of those born between 1977 and 1986 owned homes by the age of 25, just over a quarter of those born after 1997 have managed to do so.
https://www.euronews.com/business/2023/10/07/europes-housing-cri…
# Hot topic, Video International, .