Almost exactly to the day 44 years ago I picked up a half filled suitcase, got on a bus and went off to university. I left behind a maisonette on a council estate in Hackney.
Yesterday I took one of my children back to start the new term in London. With a few friends they were going to live in a former council maisonette on a council estate just three miles from the home I left in 1967.
Between them they are to pay £24,000 for a twelve month contract.
The "right to buy" has been the biggest con trick the Tory government of the 1980s pulled on working class people. Sadly some people, even on the left, think it was a wonderful gesture to encourage working class owner occupation.
That maisonette would have been bought for between £15 and £30,000. It is now in the hands of a property company who let it out on a commercial basis. Comparable properties are now being sold for nearly £250,000. It is nothing to do with owner occupation and every thing to do with property speculation. Nor has it anything to do with providing the low cost family housing needed in central London.
The local council was forced to sell a valuable community asset at a knock down price, a family has been denied a home close to where the work is, a group of students are being exploited. And the universities ducked the need to provide affordable student accomodation.
Thatcher has a lot to answer for.
Yesterday I took one of my children back to start the new term in London. With a few friends they were going to live in a former council maisonette on a council estate just three miles from the home I left in 1967.
Between them they are to pay £24,000 for a twelve month contract.
The "right to buy" has been the biggest con trick the Tory government of the 1980s pulled on working class people. Sadly some people, even on the left, think it was a wonderful gesture to encourage working class owner occupation.
That maisonette would have been bought for between £15 and £30,000. It is now in the hands of a property company who let it out on a commercial basis. Comparable properties are now being sold for nearly £250,000. It is nothing to do with owner occupation and every thing to do with property speculation. Nor has it anything to do with providing the low cost family housing needed in central London.
The local council was forced to sell a valuable community asset at a knock down price, a family has been denied a home close to where the work is, a group of students are being exploited. And the universities ducked the need to provide affordable student accomodation.
Thatcher has a lot to answer for.
