AIBU to totally disagree with 'the right to buy'?

DJ I did think there might be a place for them in the EU wine lake, but that would need to be wave power surely, not turbines?

Yawn yawn Monica. You still don't live in the real world.

Assuming your last email was directed at me stillaliveandkicking, I have an unfair advantage. I am an economist and spent most of my working life dealing with statistics like these and I also specialised in the housing market for some years. Sorry.

Why can't people just speak in a normal manner on here without spouting contrived up their arses paragraphs. Very strange.

You type faster than me, Elegran.

Wine turbines, eh? We only have wind turbines around here. I wonder which would be the most useful after Brexit.

Usually official published statistics. the figures for household size come from 'Social Trends' 39 published by the Office for National Statistics.

Numbers of houses on two specified council estates, personal experience, like counting houses with externally insulated walls.

Immigrants in high status jobs, well, go into any hospital, and I have been in many over the last 15 years as far afield as Hull and Southampton and it is impossible not to notice how many of the medical staff are from European countries, I have the same experience with GPs. I live near Oxford and within the Science Vale centred on Harwell and I know, again from personal experience how many of the scientists come from EU and other countries.

There have been many government reports and Select Committee reports (like that on Sports Direct) which are well reported across a range of media giving the information on the use of agency workers. Other reports from a a range of authoritative sources, including trades union and think tanks have reported on the problems of zero hours contracts..

I like the sound of the wine turbines, JessM Perhaps they could be linked up with the water companies and put into reverse - that would ginger up competition no end.

It's a bit hypocritical of me as I am living in a very nice ex Council House but I think Right To Buy is disastrous. It seemed a good idea when it was introduced, but when I realised that the houses sold were not being replaced it just seemed stupid. To make things worse the houses are now being bought and then rented out privately for astronomical sums. The sort of house we are living in was original sold for £16,000, DS and his family rent a flat on the same estate which would have sold for rather less. He is now paying £900 a month rent for it!

Isn't the present government extending right to buy to housing association tenants? Or was that a nasty dream?
Right to buy has been a huge exercise in transferring wealth from the public sector to individuals.
This country has suffered decades of privatising and market-ising everything under the sun. Latest silly suggestion, last week, was to introduce competition into the water industry. And we would not be in the mess we are with Hinkley point if electricity industry had not been privatised by Thatcher. Back in the day the country built its own power stations. Now everything has to be built by private companies. Liverpool Bay is full of wine turbines, all owned by private companies. And at a much more trivial level, local private bus company went bust recently, leaving some workers stranded and unable to get to work.

answer sounds so contrived it would take me at least 2 months to do that

Do you have data (figures) to put against it, stillaliveandkicking? (welcome back, by the way)

Makes me wonder where you get your data from Monica.

In DD's close of about 70 houses, I would say that 60 - 70% are now privately owned. In my own village the council recently refurbished all the houses it still owned in a small system built estate, this included putting external insulation on the houses so that is very evident which are the council houses and even in this estate of inherently not very attractive houses 60 - 70% are now privately owned.

I am sure the numbers are much lower in very large inner city council estates, but outside London council houses, especially older ones built to Parker Morris standards, are very attractive buys. Council properties have always been valued at the market price and then discounted, yes, the discounts are not as generous as they were, but they were always based on market value.

Household size has fallen from 2.9 in 1991 to 2.4 in 2008. That is equivalent to an increase in households of 17%, which equates with a demand for another 3 million houses before we even consider the housing needs of immigrants.

While immigration is an added factor mass immigration is only one factor in the increase of job insecurity and low wages. Many of the immigrants coming in, especially from the EU are highly qualified and are working in the professions, doctors, nurses, business managers, IT specialists and especially in the STEM industries where the lack of interest of British students in studying engineering and science is causing real problems. Many of the jobs with zero hours contracts are in retail, especially supermarkets and the warehouses supplying them, as the recent problems with Sports Direct has shown and the majority of retail workers are British. Similarly, many companies (like Sports Direct) do not directly employ staff but use agency staff, who can be taken on/laid off without any employers rights. Where immigrants can be found in low wage jobs it is in the industries British people do not want to work in; harvesting work in agriculture and horticulture is one.

Our economy has expanded and the number of jobs in this country has expanded, Many studies have shown that immigrants, overall contribute far more to the British economy than they draw out. The billions of pounds they pay in taxation each year would not be being paid if they were primarily in low paid work.

I think you should report these large conglomerates to HMRC.
Everyone is supposed to pay the minimum wage now.

Not sure "right to buy" has taken much of the market at all.

Due to cheap labour which mass immigration has perpetuated, large conglomerates have become more and more greedy profit wise and know they can pay ridiculous wages so the average English person can't really have any form of proper standard of living.

The rich have become richer and the working class have become poor.

Let's not blow smoke up peoples arses here.

No, we are in this mess for a whole lot of reasons -

The decline in building more houses to replace those bought under right-to-buy, because it was forbidden for so long to use that money on replacements.

The change from young people living at home with their parents to them moving out and joining those wanting rented accomodation.

The increase in broken marriages, with two homes needed instead of one.

The rise in house prices making it more difficult for first time buyers.

Space standards rising, so that families do not accept children not having their own bedroom.

Probably a lot more!

We're in this mess due to mass immigration not any other reason.

I totally believe in it. It's also not what you think these days. No, people don't buy well below the market rate anymore either. The properties are actually sold at the market rate with a discount which isn't huge. Houses should be available for mid income earners to buy too.

I find myself torn. I object in principle to the selling of council houses, but DD got on the housing ladder by buying a flat that was once council housing and then sold it and bought an ex-council house. In each case the accommodation was privately owned when she bought it.

My parents had the opposite problem, Hilda. They had owned their house and paid off the mortgage. However, it was a seven bedroomed Victorian terrace, and they had no money for the upkeep.
They sold it to a housing association who then rented them a one bedroomed flat. They then had to work out how to pay the rent, and after the money for the house had run out they had to try and claim housing benefit in their late seventies.

I think everyone was supposed to think that, Hilda, about replacing the houses they'd sold. If it had happened we would not be in the mess we are now.

Years ago when this was first introduced I naively thought that stocks would be replenished!! Many people bought their homes years ago and although some were happy with the outcome I quickly realised (from my job in banking) that many were ill equipped at being mortgage payers. Many were also completely at a loss when something went wrong with their properties having had years of very supportive council landlords.

There should always be a good stock of social housing however its managed. There will always be people who need to rent or cannot, for whatever reason, be mortgage payers. Selling off stock is shortsighted and leads to the wrong people getting a bargain whilst those who need support are left floundering.

I understood why Margaret Thatcher introduced it, but not why subsequent Labour governments didn't put a stop to it.

Councils were not allowed to use the money, Tizliz. Now they have to, and are supposed to build two for every one they sell.
Obviously not going to happen at the Barbican.