Social Housing

This is worth reading, youngsters trying to stop B&Bs being used for homeless families.

www.24housing.co.uk/news/calls-to-end-use-of-bbs-for-homeless-families/

That's what's been happening in this area for over a year. I couldn't understand how the council could afford to build new houses, then I looked into it and discovered it was because the council was borrowing via its newly formed private company.

Daphne, more detail about the pretend social housing to be built.

speye.wordpress.com/2017/02/20/bond-markets-now-controls-social-housing-thanks-to-tory-policy/

That's what the article is about, daphne.

My council has already become a private landlord dj. My understanding is that existing tenants aren't having their rents put up, but all new ones are being charged market rents, which is way above the LHA rate. This means that any new tenants are having to pay towards the rent out of their own income. That wouldn't be too bad, if it weren't for the fact that council housing is so hard to get. The vast majority of new tenants are receiving some kind of benefit, so the rent and council tax is taking a significant proportion of their benefits.

The council claims that becoming a private landlord was the only way it could borrow money to build, because there are restrictions on council borrowing. New regulations mean that the councils will be forced to sell these houses, if the tenant wants to buy. Apparently, some tenants are borrowing money from friends and relatives to buy. The council says it knows this is happening and claims it has to charge market rent to cover the losses when it's forced to sell. Madness!

Place marker

This is weird; the law of unintended consequences or did they do it on purpose?

speye.wordpress.com/2017/02/19/tories-force-all-councils-to-become-private-landlords-in-white-paper/

Thank you for that link DD - I had only heard what the French farmers say here. Certainly the field round us looks hard and bare - they have been doing what looks like deep rough ploughing and leaving it over the winter.
Maize also is awful for people with allergies and asthma. DD cannot visit if the farmer has planted maize and it is near to flowering.- she was ill one year just before going home and the dr told her she had farmers lung - when the flowers get damp with dew etc it gives off a fungus and the spores cause all this. OH needs to use his Inhalers more at that time too.

I remembered reading an article about maize, so I searched for it:

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/feb/17/farmers-uk-flood-maize-soil-protection

Apparently, maize leaves the fields empty during the rainy season.

DJ do they grow maize at all? I understand that causes problems for the land after a few crops. The farmers around us seem to do a lot of ploughing afterwards and need to rotate crops or the top soil erodes they say.
Pickering in Yorks managed to stop the flooding by using natural methods and to stop the rapid run off - interesting as they used what I assume is modified farming methods as well as trees etc. It worked during the last flooding in the area.
If you google Pickering flood defences you will get info - I happened to catch it on a News programme.

As you say to build houses on a flood plain is silly - would the occupiers get house insurance?

By the way, my husband was an architect. I know quite a bit about building houses, and where not to.

Not at all furious, mair. Just wondering why you keep flogging a dead horse. Got a smile on my face.

I know we need houses; just not where this particular builder wanted to build them. There are sites available in four other places in the village that will not cause extra flooding or traffic problems.
Apparently there have been four builders who have put in for planning permission on those fields over the years, and every plan has been turned down. You'd think they'd learn. This builder even claimed the village bus, which runs mornings only, could be used as part of the commute. It's a minibus taxi.
The water authority put in new drains down the lane, and road humps to stop the water draining off the fields down the lane. All that's happened is the run-off has been diverted and runs down the other side of the road until it crosses over to the usual side again.
It's an old mining village, and there are culverts everywhere.

Are you an expert in flood defences, as well as everything else, Mair?

Do you ever stop being furious and lashing out, DJ?

I have made no claim of expertise in flooding, simply recounted what happened in my town.

Elegran
Your post is interesting, and I think what they did here was deepen the stream when it reaches lower land, not as it runs off the hill.

Sorry, dj, but we do need houses, but it doesn't make sense to build on a natural flood plain.

I have also been told by older farmers that the way fields are ploughed makes a difference. I really am no expert in this, but I understand that modern ploughing creates a sort of crust, which doesn't allow rain water to penetrate the ground before having to run off. I live in a chalk area, so maybe that's only relevant here.

When I first moved here, most of the rural roads had ditches either side, but it seems these are no longer cleared - I guess that was the same digging furrows. The water now runs from the fields on to roads.

Thanks, Elegran. You understand. The fields where the houses were to be built are at the top of a hill, with land sloping away quite a lot in three directions. I can't see the farmer planting lots of trees in his sheep fields, unless, of course, he can get more money from it.
The last time the village flooded it was farmers who got to the centre before the firebrigade and brought pumps to stop the houses flooding again. It was a few shops that time. We need farmers rather than houses.

Crossed posts, DJ.

Dredging upstream just cuts a neater channel for rainwater to run down more efficiently to the places that flood. It is not the only answer.

Digging or ploughing furrows parallel to contour lines would take rain water horizontally along hillsides and allow it to soak into the ground instead of rushing straight down watercourses. Planting more trees, particularly alder, would drink up more water, and the roots would bind the earth and stop so much of it washing down to silt up further downstream, so less water would pour down.

Dredging on hills actually increases the rate of run-off.
The village will flood faster. That's what we were told when the builders said they would put two lagoons in front of people's houses. The water has to go somewhere, and the middle of the village from all directions seems to be favoured.
Are you an expert in flood defences, as well as everything else, Mair?

Then why dont they dredge or even deepen the streams? I live near a stream which historically has flooded, deepened, flood overflow tanks installed and problem seems to be sorted!

No. It's before the water reaches the rivers, just streams and burns. They are actually dredged. It doesn't make any difference.
It's the amount of water involved coming downhill into the village centre.

"I think it's a problem to do with climate change."

Or maybe as in Somerset its simply failure to dredge the rivers?
All our rivers before taming by man were uncontrollable effusions liable to flooding changing course and causing mayhem

Sarcasm, Mair. Heard of it?
The reason the housing estate plans at the back of us has been turned down four times now, including by a government inspector, is because the village floods.
The reason we got a million on flood alleviation is because the village floods.
The reason the flood defences were built is because the village floods.
The village still floods, so building another 150 houses in a field that seems to drain into the lane would be irresponsible, in the opinion of architects, planners, the water authority, the government inspector, the MP, old Uncle Tom Cobley and all.
The builder is the only one who wants it there.
The village floods from two directions, down the lane and from the burn. Can't remember how many streams feed into the burn that overflows. I am sure if you look back, you will be able to find it, just as you found that post about the fact that the village floods.

I think it's a problem to do with climate change.

"I think we are fortunate that the village floods..."