Local Homes For Local People, A Drawback.

I notice from the Homefinder website that, in relation to the council bungalow currently empty in King St preference will be given to those with a Silverton connection. Looking at other advertisments on the site I see that this stipulation is increasingly being used in relation to properties in other areas of Mid Devon.

Whilst the aim of this stipulation is indeed laudable I can see an immediate problem. f you are a single person living in silverton you are only eligable to apply for a one bedroom property. One bedroom properties in Silverton are few and far between and do not come up for allocation often. This being the case you might well feel your only option is to apply for housing elsewhere in the district.If the stipulation that more and more properties in the district will be let with a preference given to people who have connections with the immediate local area what chance do people from outside that town or village have of getting housed ?.

The point of all this is that its all very well to give preference for housing to people who have connections with a local area if that area already has sufficient social housing stock of all kinds that people can apply for if it becomes available. Otherwise we end up with yet another barrier to people getting a house. The answer still is that adequate stocks of social housing need to be built and less attention has to be paid to the NIMBYs when doing so. If governments of all political persuasions worldwide and in Britain in particular can throw hundreds of billions of pounds into propping up capitalism in crisis surely its now the time to push the point that in an advanced western democracy there is no need for anyone to be without a permanant roof over their heads. In housing as in much else, 'People before Profit' should be the slogan for the new era.