Bedroom tax breaches human rights.

Perhaps we could get over Sel's probable slip of the tongue and my ill-advised defence of it, and get back to the subject of the thread?

Just to be clear, I wasn't suggesting that I believe the state pension, child benefit or numerous other benefits are handouts rather than entitlements as a result of an ongoing contract with the government. I was just pointing out how insidious is the language used by Ian Duncan Smith, George Osborne et al.

I am sure we all understood what you meant, Absent. And I agree - if the government keeps repeating the same lies about 'workers and shirkers' and 'benefit dodgers', many people will believe them. Language is a very important weapon.

I used the term 'handout' in connection with money doled out to people who don't need it. Is 'gift' better? Present? My point is that many people do not need winter fuel payments, free school meals or free travel. I am completely in favour of those who need such things getting them.

I don't agree with the concept of universal benefits as I explained previously. The idea that we need the State to pay for all school meals for 3-7 year olds, regardless of parental income - for the children of rich parents too, it's a cheap vote grabber. Lie down and give thanks to your benign Government and take no responsibility for yourselves.

Did I mention deserving poor? No. I said rich people shouldn't have the State pay for their childrens' meals or their heating.

That's O.K. then - I'm not rich!

Universal benefits is a good idea. It ensures that those who need the financial help get it without having to demean themselves. It can be clawed back from those who do not need it through the tax system.
I'm sure as pensioners that is what happens. The winter fuel payment can be taxed that way as well by adding it to the pension.
The bus pass does not need to be because you have to go to your council offices to get one. Can't imagine Vince Cable queuing up for his.
Anyway, this is beside the point.
There is an article in today's Guardian about housebuilders and councils who are failing to comply with affordable housing targets. 2300 fewer affordable homes have been built over the last five years than should have been. Of course, it would not make any difference if they were supposed to have been 3 bedroomed ones, as the spare room tax would still penalise families with two children under 16 or 10 years old depending on whether they were same sex or not.

The local council were planning to build two affordable houses on the spare land near my house. Both houses had two bedrooms so obviously no thought for those who are being expected to downsize to one bedroom properties.

They withdrew the plans btw when it was pointed out that they'd planned to build on private land, had shown two parking spaces for the houses on someone else's private land and the water board agreed with the local residents that the drains wouldn't cope with two more properties (they already flood when if we have a downpour).

Tesco are now going to build eight storeys of flats above their new stores - I don't suppose there will be any one-bedroomed amongst them and I doubt if they will be 'affordable.'

They certainly aren't. They have done this in a store not too far from me in a distinctly unfashionable area. One bedroom flats have been snapped up at £230000.

Vampirequeen, the whole of Hull and Holderness is a flood plain, so no new houses should be built there ever with that reasoning.
It is now perfectly legal for builders to get planning permission to build at the bottom of someone's long garden and then to buy up the land through compulsory purchase. Daft, isn't it?

Our street has particular problems as the drains weren't put in properly in the first place and were never meant to cope with modern plumbing. Most of the houses pre-date sewerage systems and running water. There is a capped well on the waste ground they wanted to build on. When I first moved in the ash privy was still in the yard.

YES - the Labour party has at last said clearly - it will reverse the bedroom tax if elected. Thanks Ed

I should think so too

What seems to have been glossed over in all the furore about Miliband's dad is that a court in Glasgow has said that the bedroom tax breaches the human rights of a woman with MS whose husband needs a separate bedroom because of the special bed she needs, and that the Tories will repeal the Human Rights Act if voted in again.

Interesting jen

Why can't they repeal it immediately?

Jendurham I don't understand who said that the Tories will repeal the Human Rights Act and on what grounds.

Greatnan Why would you want the Human Rights Act repealed at any time, let alone immediately?

Absent Thersa May - she also threatened to withdraw from the European Court of Human Rights.

Been walking around a great deal lately taking MiL out and venturing down roads, cutting down back alleys, etc and finding streets I'd never walked down before.
Now our local authority may be very different from many, I don't know, but what has struck me is the amount of small, one or two bedroomed council owned properties there are. Some are on small, well established estates mixed in with larger properties, some are in groups clustered around a community hall, many are obviously of the 'sheltered housing types'. Someone in planning has taken a good integrated approach sometime in the past. There are play areas, communal gardens, open spaces, ginnels connecting areas, and so on. Some of the houses are now privately owned, most have well kept gardens, newish cars on the drives, but others are still owned by the council.
I know we've moved on from the OP but it struck me that not all councils are lacking in smaller social housing units and it surprised me how much is tucked away in pretty little streets. I supposed this is by way of a 'well done' to planners in our town who, years ago, had the ability to foresee this need.

On Question Time, a Conservative minister defended the proposals to stop benefits to people under age 25 by saying they preferred to target the young to make savings and preserve benefits for the elderly.

Should we all start Voting Conservative now?

I thought they were promising to repeal the bedroom tax!
More old people vote than young people - says she, cynically.

Aka - yes, some of the social housing built in the 40's and 50's is brilliant, and was built in the spirit of 45. There isn't enough of it. The selling of of council property, with the refusal to allow councils to use the money raised to build more housing was simply wrong. That's why we are in this awful mess now.
Jendurham - I think as well as the Glasgow case, there has been one in London where a Judge has found in favour of the tenant.
The Human Rights Act is being used to add to anti european feelings. I am as cross as everyone that people who commit serious crimes and then argue article 6 (right to family life) to stay in the Uk, have immigration Judges finding in their favour, it seems all too often. But - to talk about repealing or ducking out of the HRA seems bonkers to me.

Yes quite, re HRA iam64.
There are a lot of rural council houses that are in idyllic settings, with stunning views - many of the inhabitants got a seriously good deal out of Mrs Thatcher didn't they. I think the winning terrace overlooks Three Cliffs Bay in Gower, voted the best view in the UK at one stage.
The other side of the coin is that there are some truly grim examples of 60s and 70s housing, long past their knock-down-by date that are having to be updated rather than replaced because they are terraced and half the terrace is in private ownership. The estate around the school i used to work in as a governor was a classic example - rows of flimsy flat roofed boxes. Oh and you cannot drive between school and housing - you have to walk through some horrible shops and flats that were put in later, like a Berlin wall. Not nice walk at night. Lovely trees though

I can think of many groups that would love Britain to rescind from the HRA - police and employers spring to mind.

A council flat near me recently sold for £670,000. No doubt the original tenants bought it for around £20,000 in the 1980s.

A nice windfall for them and a scandalous loss of income for the local authority and tax payers.