Should people raised in countryside expect to be able to stay there?

I think it is inhumane and lacking in compassion to suggest that families should be moved out of an area simply because they are not wealthy. Do we want ghettos, with gates? Poor familes often have good support networks of mums, aunts, grans, cousins, etc. The councils in the North made bad mistakes in the 1950's and 1960's by 'clearing' whole communities and spreading them round the cities into 'overspill' estates. What happened often was that they swapped their shiny new council houses with people still in old terraced properties, just to get back to their roots. I know Birkenhead had quite a good scheme, of clearing one street at a time, putting the families in temporary accommodation, and renovating and updating the terraced houses with bathrooms and kitchens. Not everybody wants a garden and certainly most families did not want to be uprooted and planted miles from their families, friends and employment.
I see that immigrants are also getting stick on another thread. I suppose we could amalgamate the two most usual hate figures of the right, and just talk about single mother immigrants.

movedalot. You are talking about children who are living in a secure family unit. It's a different kettle of fish for children who have witnessed the break up of their parents' marriage. I know at least three young women in our village who are hoping that new builds in a community land scheme will give them a chance of shared ownership. They have full time jobs and family close by. The last thing they want to do is move away from their support network.

Goldengirl, many people who own their own property live in 'one bedders' - it may not be their ideal choice, but they've had to cut their cloth according to means. That's life. We live in a very large house, so my comment may seem hypocritical, but the house cost us a lot less than a one bedder in Islington, as we live in the sticks in a very cheap area (which is no problem as we are retired so no need to be near jobs). When our daughters went to university, we rented our spare room and one of our daughter's room to pay for their rentals at uni. Maybe a good idea for people with spare rooms to rent them to suitable people in need of accommodation?

nanej Yes, Islington is a desirable area which many people I worked with could not afford and therefore is much more expensive than some other parts of London.

I take your point about how hard it is if people have to move out of a property which is bigger than they need but the other side of the coin is the ones who currently live in overcrowded accommodation which does not seem fair either.

Greatnan I note your sarcastic comment but the fact remains she is a single mother of five children living in a very expensive area. No amount of sarcasm alters the facts.

granjura I agree with you. This is quite a simple matter of choice between those who don't need all the room that they have and those who do. Those in the greatest need should be given the housing.

My own children movds schools because we moved with DH's job and they had no problems making new friends and fitting in each time. Children are very adaptable and mine have grown up to be adaptable and responsible adults.

Yes, in an ideal world we would all have plenty of room and everything else we want but unfortunately we don't live in an ideal world.

I'd hate to live in a one bedder. Where would I put up someone who came to stay or a carer if I needed one later on? In my area homes are being built with no community centre, no local shops where one can nip out for a newspaper or a litre of milk. They are mainly 3 storey monstrosities with piddly little garden space and virtually no storage. There's no space to swing a mouse let alone a cat so 1 bedders don't bear thinking about. I'm sure I'll get called 'selfish' but I've worked jolly hard all of my life and had my share of very difficult times and as I get older I want that little bit of space to have my books, enjoy the company of friends and relatives and potter.

I was brought up in the country and now live in the town and mourn the loss of the landscape and animals that once inhabited it. I've moved to accommodate DH's employment but found my own as well and either walked or commuted by public transport - or car -depending on availability. I'm sick of the Government telling me how I should live my life. Perhaps if they'd tighten the immigration laws like the Aussies we wouldn't be in such a mess!

Totally see what you are saying - and yet. There are 1000s of people of rent privately who have their own modest homes who a/ cannot afford to live in Islington although they'd love too b/ have had to move out of Islington because they couldn't afford the private rents c/ who do not have a spare bedroom at all, despite having worked so hard to buy their own house.

So the present bedroom tax needs to take account of handicap, age, and other circumstances - I totally agree. But sharing a bedroom is not a disaster for young kids - and 1 bed low rise flats need to be built in local areas to house the elderly who are no longer in need of larger houses - if care could be taken so that those elderly people can be moved together with their neighbours in the same situation, why not. Those larger houses are DESPERATELY needed for families - those who have to share 3 or 4 to a room have a greater need surely than those who'd quite like to keep 1 or 2 spare rooms for occasional visitors.

I wasn't thinking of you, Merlot, when I made my tongue-in-cheek remark, but of Movedalot's reference to the mother of five who wanted to stay in Islington.
Once children, who may have already had an unsettled background, are happy in a local school, it seems harsh to force them to move.
Yes, of course people need a spare room for family/carer/friends to stay, or if they need to sleep separately for health reasons. I hate the idea that because somebody is not well off they have no right to a normal family life.

moved are you suggesting that only wealthier people can live in Islington or similar areas? I did not understand your comments about the woman who may be moved out of her 'home' and your friend who would like to live there.

All areas need mixed housing so that different people: age/socio economic/family/single etc etc can make up the community.

I understand the theory of limiting public spending through capping rate subsidy but I am not convinced it is going to have the desired impact! I am able to offer support to my DDs because I can have the grandchildren to stay in one of my (3) spare rooms. Is this kind of family activity to be limited to middle class people like me? It does seem unfair that every older couple who live in public housing have to move to a one bed flat. They will not all be the feckless & undeserving that some right-wing media like to suggest!! My MiL, hard working & decent working class woman lived in her 2 bed council flat in trendy Wandsworth until she died aged 98. Then the council sold it to a private buyer!

Any moment now I can see that my spare rooms becoming cash cows for government: any unoccupied bedrooms in privately owned homes will be subject to an additional tax. Alternatively I could let them to families forced to move from Islington!

While people are saying the 'bedroom tax' is fair - it hasnt been properly thought through - quelle suprise!

In private rented , you can still get housing benefit, but the 'spare bedroom ' rule already applied.. private rented is more expensive, but young responsible families ( like my DS ) have no choice, both working, = not enough points.

BUT, as the majority of social housing was built for families, they tend to have 3 bedrooms, so there is nowhere to relocate the over accommodated to, within social housing. Therefore they lose benefit - remember , benefit also gets paid to working families on low incomes....so , people will have to move out of social housing , into smaller privately rented homes which will cost more , therefore won't actually save any money at all, but will , due to ,market forces, push private rents up, which will in turn cost even more, and also cost youngsters not claiming benefits more, which means they cant save for their house deposits.. setting up a rather nasty vicious circle

All they had to do was make the bedroom tax apply to people that HAD REFUSED suitable alternative accommodation, and not made pensioners exempt, as they are the biggest house blockers of all, for whom 1 bedroom homes have been specifically built..........

No, merlot, you were just pointing out that single parents are often disadvantaged by housing policies in their area. I agree with you.

Actually most affordable homes in our area( dorset)are covenanted, so local people get priority, and they can only be sold at the same % below market value as they were bought for ..... shame the tories didn't apply that rule when they flogged off our housing stock cheap, which used to be the affordable homes of our parents generation

Even in Posh Poundbury they were made to have social and affordable housing.
We also have very successful community land trusts here in west dorset....

There are jobs around here, but very low paid ones, the hardest problem being public transport - when I lived in a village three miles from Dorchester , the last bus left town at 5.30 = so if you worked in a shop you had no chance of using it, and in the morning you had to get one at 7.30 and hang around for 3/4 hour before going to work, as the 8.30 got you there too late! This meant many families having no choice other than to run 2 cars, which skews the indices of deprivation stats, makes rural areas appear more wealthy, and therefore get less central gov grant.

Rurality also makes public services more expensive to run, but somehow this message has never made its way to the brains of central gov, no matter who is in power ! they just keep pouring money in to inner cities and HS2, when the south coast main line is falling into the sea !

I wasn't criticising single mothers greatnan

Those pesky single mothers again - destroying the economy with their masses of fatherless kids!
Lilygran, thank you for your usual compassionate and well reasoned reply.

My sister has lived in her council house for 28 years. She brought up her four sons there, and has a network of support from other elderly people in the close. She can catch a small bus from right outside the door which takes her to the local shopping precinct every day, where she meets friends for a pot of tea and also joins women's groups for two days a week. She is quite severely disabled and unable to walk more than about 100 yards. She loves her home and has spent thousands of pounds over the years in decorating it and making a lovely, albeit very small, garden.
There are no, repeat NO, one bedroomed properties anywhere in the vicinity. If she were forced to move, she would lose her supportive neighbours, her means of transport, and much of her social life. In fact, I think it would kill her. She is 76 and in very poor health indeed, so I think the council is taking the view that she won't be occupying the house for long. Yes, I know all about the families waiting for houses - what a shame so many were sold off by previous governments and very few were built.

Affordable housing is also a requirement of the newly divorced who don't want to move away from friends and family. Single parents with jobs and children who are settled in school are often at the mercy of greedy private landlords.

Keeping a car on the road is a big expense for someone on a low wage, so if you live in the country more than a reasonable walk to work, you rely on public transport. That is laughable - sometimes only one bus a day in each direction. It is not comparable with London or any other city.

With a car, you often cannot count on minor roads being cleared of snow and salted.

I don't suppose you walked the six miles to work into London, Eloethen , though three might have been reasonable.

That was what I meant, Eloethan - by "where there is employment" I meant access to their job. 3 miles is virtually walking distance - certainly cycling!
Most - I accept not all- work is in urban areas and suburban accommodation will depend on the area. Many people do have to commute long distances paying high fares out of taxed income simply because accommodation in or near the major cities is so expensive - not in the country.

Lilygran Agree with you re transport and what you say about the concentration of development in the south east.

Movedalot Granted, 6 miles isn't that far if you have a car. My journey required a bus into Colchester and another bus to the outskirts of Colchester (about 40-60 mins each way).

Most of the people I currently know travel between 40 mins to an hour (or more in some cases, e.g. Rutland to Holborn, Ipswich to St Paul's, Horsham to Bank, Burnham on Crouch to Green Park, Hastings to St Paul's, etc., etc.).

6 miles is hardly a 'commute'!

eloethan I think most of us would consider those distances as still where they live. 6 miles really isn't very far.

The problem arises when the 'commute' is more than people on low wages can afford. There are lots of towns and villages in formerly industrial areas where there is plenty of cheap housing but no jobs within miles and often poor or no public transport. Where there is public transport, the fares may be so high that they represent too high a proportion of potential income. People on good salaries can afford to live in the country and pay several thousand pounds a year to travel into big cities. People on stupidly high salaries can even commute across continents and live where they like. What we need is a revival of employment where people live, rather than more and more development of the SE and the Home Counties.

I don't understand people saying that you have to live "where there is employment". I lived in a small village in Suffolk, and my mum still lives there. When I left school, I worked in Colchester - 6 miles up the road. A lot of the people in the village don't work in it - they travel to nearby towns - Colchester, Ipswich, Sudbury, Bury St Edmunds - or even into London.

When I lived in Lancashire, I travelled 3 miles to work. I travelled 6 miles into work from the outskirts of London to my job in Central London.

Surely most people have some sort of commute to work?

I have followed this with interest as I feel no-one has the "right" to live anywhere, by which I mean, you go where there is work. We went to London when we married where accommodation (rented of course) was horrifying expensive - a 1 1/2 room attic funished flat in Greenwich not a "posh" area, for £45 a month which was about half my after-tax salary as a teacher. There was no question of buying and had I stayed in Scotland in the small town where I was brought up we could easily have afforded a house. Everything is topsy turvy now, but in my experience most young people do not want to live in villages when they first set up home. They want to be where there is a night life, where their friends live and where there is employment. There is "affordable" (depends of course) in many small towns but to me the great loss is of rented accommodation. Council houses have been bought up and are now sold on for many times their original price so that part is taken out of the housing pool available to the truly low paid or unemployed. Private rented accommodation usually comes at a price from landlords who have also bought up much of the cheaper end of the housing market as buy to let investments - there may be some on GN whose pension that constitutes. The fact is that there is accommodation - but not necessarily what some people want or where they want it.

I wouldn't shoot you down for that Granjura. Surely if someone else is paying for your accommodation you don't have as much right to determine where you live as if you are paying for it yourself? I am thinking about all the people who struggle to maintain themselves who would love to live in some of these places but cannot afford it.

When the cap on housing benefit was announced I saw a young woman on TV who had 5 children and lived in Islington. She said she would have to move away from there into a less desirable area and thought that was wrong because her children were happy there. I have friends in London who would love to be able to afford to live in Islington! There was no mention of a male in their lives and at the end of the interview she was asked where she came from and if she would go back. She was from Jamaica and said she wouldn't go back because there was no welfare! Incidentally, she had a huge flat screen TV and we didn't! Maybe she wasn't typical but it is that sort of attitude which makes others get upset.

Same in Italy. We regularly go to a small village in Southern Tuscany - the old hill town is slowly being taken over by Germans and Dutch- whilst the locals have moved to small modern apartment blocks in a new town a few kms away!

Not really sure if people ever have absolute right to stay where they were born and bred, if there are no jobs there. I also know many young people who've been unemployed for a very long time and still expect the tax payer to pay for them to live in very expensive accommodation in London, where they say it is their 'right' to live there and won't go anywhere else (most of them not born and bred there either).

I will be shot down I know - but, with proper exception made for special circumstances (foster homes, handicap, Army personnel, etc) the spare bedroom tax is fair to me. What is wrong for children to share bedrooms - I did share with my brother until I was 11, my daughters shared for a very long time - and when the eldest went to Uni, we rented her room to pay for her accommodation cost elsewhere. Our cleaning lady had 4 children and they lived in a Council house near us- but when the kids left, they were moved by the Council to a bungalow in another part of town, so their house could be used by a family. She was sad to leave the area, but totally agreed it was fair- and adjusted very well. Totally agree that Councils should be building much more social housing, and much more smaller 1 or 2 bedroom bungalows and flats, as well as family homes.

It's the same the whole world over......many French villages have only retired residents and are dying. The young want to move to the town for jobs and social life. Some villages were kept alive by British immigrants who renovated almost derelict houses and lived there permanently, but the supply of willing Brits has dried up now. Most French people would prefer to buy a shiny new house on an estate close to amenities.