Do we expect too much as a right in Great Britain?

https://fullfact.org/factchecks/council_house_building_margaret_thatcher_labour_government-29270
Your link did not work for me, rose. Hope this one does.

I will put my wooden spoon back in the rack and go to catch up on some tv programmes.

W1A here I come.

Or a jaundiced view, whichever you prefer!

Although this report does not say that Margaret Thatcher's government built more properties for sale.
Is it not also a fact that the Labour Government closed more pits than were closed under Mrs Thatcher's government?

Unless someone knows better, this is what I mean by rose-tinted spectacles.

Thanks. At least that's a rather more balanced view.

https://fullfact.org/factchecks/council_house_building_margaret_thatcher_labour_government-29270

Not saying I agree or disagree with the above, just a link I found which I thought was relevant.

Oh, will have another look.

Couldn't access your link I'm afraid, rosequartz - 'Page not found'.

ayse I agree with everything you say and, in particular, the part about the madness of paying housing benefit to landlords instead of the government building social housing that is of decent quality and has affordable rents.

A debate is not a dispute.

If people are debating something, they are not necessarily "taking the moral high ground" if they choose to disagree with you, are they? It is an accusation that you once levelled at me, ninny and I do think it is unsubstantiated.

The Conservatives under Mrs T may have built the houses but they were nearly all houses for sale. During her reign the number of council /housing association/social/affordable housing built, call it what you will, was abysmally low. To the haves it was given, to the have-nots it was taken away.

ninny, I wasn't having a "snipe". I enjoy debates, have many friends of different political persuasions, none of whom describe me as having unrealistic left wing views. I don't enjoy personal attacks and was simply responding to your comments.

I need some type of SPECTACLES though.

True, Hollydaze. Some people have rose-tinted specatacles. I hope I am a realist.

www.fullfact.org/factcheckscouncil_house_building_margaret_thatcher_labour_government-29270

The Left might view Thatcher as an easy scapegoat. But here's the thing: the 221,000 houses built in Thatcher's last year have never been matched since. Both Labour and the Conservatives have consistently shirked house-building. In the context of spending targets on the NHS or education, housing was for too long deemed an unobtrusive way of cutting. You might get voted out because the schools or hospitals weren't good enough, but whoever heard of a government booted out for not building ?

blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/timwigmore/100237863/the-conservatives-or-labour-whos-to-blame-for-britains-housing-crisis/

That was a very good post ayse.

However, if you read Phil Mullan's The Imaginary Time Bomb, you would see him explain the governments (not just mine or yours but several around the world) usage of the ageing population as an excuse to reign in public service provision: us.macmillan.com/theimaginarytimebomb/PhilMullan it gives a brief synopsis on the link. It would appear that pieces are being put in place to bring about a substantial reduction in what the state supplies which will make Britain much more like the countries you have described.

As a wealthy country we need to provide for all our citizens in health, welfare, education and housing. This 'right' was fought for by the working people of this country and passed by the government after WW2

I couldn't agree more with that statement. I have said before that what Hitler failed to do, is now being achieved from within our own ranks. Such a depressing thought.

Thatcher did not just start the boom in council house selling. Many houses in pit villages were also sold off. Then when the pits closed the villages became more or less workless. Nobody wanted/wants to buy houses in pit villages, so the miners and their families could not move to get work as they could not sell their houses, but still had mortgages to pay.
That was one of the big cons of the buy your own house schemes.

Thankyou, ayse, for your thoughtful answer.

I do not think that selling off council houses to their owners was a bad thing; however, I do firmly believe the money shoukd have been ring-fenced to provide more housing stock.
The buy-to-let housing boom caused a lot of damage to owner-occupation in this country - (in fact I believe the property programmes on the television also made some contribution) encouraging people to buy up property for rental purposes, resulting in the pushing up of prices and making homes out of the reach of first-time buyers.

The Welfare State introduced after WW2 is a wonderful ideal, but I believe needs to be very carefully managed so that it reaches those who need it and is not abused by others who know how to work the system.
Having spent time Australia, I notice that many people I know have private healthcare. It seems to be something they accept. I am not sure how much Medicare costs in comparison to the contribution we make towards the NHS from national insurance and general taxes.
I hope that the introduction of ObamaCare in America will go well, as it was sickening to hear about such vociferous opposition to it. A wealthy country which cannot look after its less wealthy and able citizens is a country without compassion.

We should not take what we have in this country for granted, but unfortunately I think we sometimes do.

I thought the soldiers who died in the Second World War were fighting to save Belgium and France as well as Great Britain.
The Germans took Belgium and the Belgians set up an interim government in Britain. In the first World War, there was a Begian town set up near Chester-le-Street where the women made armaments for the war effort. The Belgians of Birtley, they were called. The township was called Elizabethville.

iam64 if you had taken time to read my post i said some of the younger generation not all of them but i think you knew that but just wanted to have a snipe at me and try and take the moral high ground. the trouble with you and some other gn's you just can't take it that others don't agree with your unrealistic left wing views.
as for the spirit of 1945 i am sure the soldiers you gave their lives to protect our country would turn in their graves that we have willingly surrendered our once great country to faceless bureaucrats in brussels.

ayse, a well argued contribution to the debate. When I was a member of a metropolitan council in the 90s, one of the worst frustrations was that we held money from the sale of council houses but were not allowed to use this to meet the growing need for social housing. I'd say that the Tory members of council were - though perhaps not vocally - also frustrated by this policy

Great post ayes - Aka I agree with you that any money raised from selling off social housing should have been spent on replacing the housing stock lost by one of the worst things Thatcher's government contributed to the country.
But - I'm with ayes in saying it should never have been sold. In what have always been hard to let areas, the majority of the former council houses that were sold, are now owned by private landlords. I find it galling that people who were evicted by the council, drug dealers for example, can now rent privately, often of the same street from which they were evicted.

You raise a good point about selling off social housing ayse we are still feeling the effects of Thatcherism today. It's not the selling off, it's not using the money to replenish the social housing stock.

I'm disgustedly too at the cost of a university education.

Well said, ayse! Your last sentence sums it all up well; we need to protect what we have for the benefit of all.