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Post by politician2 on Nov 21, 2023 13:50:02 GMT
It's a fucking disgrace and if you think that is an improvement which makes Britain "a much better place than it was when Thatcher took over in 1979" then I despair Britain is in a better place than it was in the late seventies. Back then, inflation had hit 20% and was deeply embedded, causing untold misery for people on fixed incomes. This time it barely exceeded 10% and was rapidly brought down by quick intervention from the Bank of England. Right now the base rate is 5.25%. Under Labour in 1979 it hit 14%, making mortgages and loans cripplingly expensive – and it is generally poorer people who need to borrow and richer people who save. Right now the top rate of income tax is 45%. From 1974 to 1979 it was 98%, stifling entrepreneurship and causing a massive brain drain. Even at those rates, Labour was completely unable to balance the books and in 1976 Britain came closer than it ever has to national bankruptcy, requiring the intervention of the International Monetary Fund, which demanded some of the most savage austerity measures in history in return for financial support. Right now, widespread industrial action has caused only limited inconvenience to the British public. Back then, the unions were capable of bringing Britain to a standstill: shops were empty of food, corpses were rotting unburied and rats were swarming across mountains of rubbish in Central London, reducing it to the level of a third-world city. Whereas the Callaghan government had been craven in the face of its union paymasters, Thatcher gave them a bloody nose and like all bullies they backed down when they realised their behaviour was no longer going to be tolerated. Right now even the poorest people have access to smartphones. computers, satellite TV and other luxuries that would have been unimaginable to poor people in the seventies: a time when 25% of British households could not even afford a landline. For sure, property has become hugely expensive and unaffordable for many people, but that's partly because many of the other necessities of life have become much cheaper in real terms. But there's a reason that no government, Tory or Labour, has deviated significantly from the Thatcherite template since 1979, and nor will Starmer if he gets in. That's because we've witnessed the alternative and it was vastly worse. |
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Post by Lord Emsworth on Nov 21, 2023 16:36:03 GMT
I'll accept that some things have improved but we lost a heck of lot too Did it need to be handled in the way it was? Not for me I notice you completely dodged the housing issue which is far far worse partly due to Thatcher's council house self off Hunt et al have presided over a housing crisis Homes are now an investment not a place to live It clearly suits him and his landlord cronies to restrict housing supply so that the cost of renting far outstrips inflation therefore condemning an entire generation to probably being unable to ever buy their own house. They coin it in whilst many ordinary people are being exploited. There's no legislation to keep rents down, nope it's all down to "the market rate" which is excessively high due to a shortage of housing stock They even stop local authorities from being able to build social housing The housing crisis is totally down to the Tories That Hunt has done nothing to improve the situation but instead buys the a load of rental properties (below market rate thanks to a Tory donor) (also conveniently forgot to declare them until prompted to do so) tells me all I need to know about his priorites Self interest over helping people worse off than himself It's a fucking disgrace and if you think that aspect of life is an improvement which makes Britain "a much better place than it was when Thatcher took over in 1979" then I despair |
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Post by politician2 on Nov 21, 2023 16:42:22 GMT
I'll accept that some things have improved but we lost a heck of lot too Did it need to be handled in the way it was? Not for me I notice you completely dodged the housing issue which is far far worse partly due to Thatcher's council house self off I can't remember anything being preferable in the late seventies to now (apart from the music scene, which was less extensive but more exciting). But your second point is the salient one: a lot of my left-wing friends, if pressed, will admit that Britain couldn't have continued as it was in the seventies; a modern nation simply couldn't function like that. What they argue is that somebody needed to do some version of what Thatcher did, but they wish it had been done a bit differently. I always compare Thatcher to the CEO brought in to turn around a failing business – many of the decisions taken were both radical and quite harsh, but the main thing is that the business survived, which it wouldn't have done without the intervention. I fully supported Thatcher in encouraging working-class people to become socially mobile and own their homes, but a lot more safeguards should have been put in place and the public housing stock replenished in some shape or form. The anti-private landlord consensus that seems to have arisen in recent years, and which even the Tories seem to share, doesn't help: more regulation will drive small landlords (who usually have good relationships with their tenants) out of the market, leaving it to the big institutional landlords and the complete chancers who don't care whether they break the law or not. |
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Post by Lord Emsworth on Nov 21, 2023 16:49:06 GMT
I don't think there's much to chose between big and small landlords We just need some basic protections and some kind of cap on rent Make it harder to exploit renters, give them some certainty and security This article spells out the issues - it's a terrible situation - yet another thing the Tories have presided over and made significantly worse over their tenure... www.theguardian.com/society/2023/nov/13/five-charts-explain-state-uk-rental-sectorEDIT: Both my kids are renters - paying an astronomical amount for pretty shitty accommodation |
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Post by politician2 on Nov 21, 2023 18:25:47 GMT
I'd be very cautious about taking anything The Guardian says about landlords and renting at face value. Private landlords are to The Guardian what asylum seekers are to the Daily Mail. It loathes them as representatives of the "rentier" class and publishes lots of clickbait articles about them, knowing its readers will respond with hundreds of angry comments, thus driving up its page views.
Rent controls are a stupid idea and will simply force more landlords out of the market, thus exacerbating the housing crisis. Landlord/tenant law is already heavily slanted against residential landlords (as opposed to commercial landlords, who have enormous power over their tenants – no wonder there are so many empty shops) and tilting it still further will not improve the situation.
The answer is to relax planning restrictions, as planning consent is the most expensive aspect of housebuilding. But nobody wants to grasp that political nettle as almost everybody thinks more housing should be built – but should not be built anywhere near them.
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Post by Lord Emsworth on Nov 21, 2023 20:31:16 GMT
Did you read it?
It's not particularly anti landlord
It's more of a general analysis of the sector
It's a story I have heard and read in many places
Agree about planning regs - going to have to happen
But there's lots of other things that could happen too that would ease the situation including the Govt's own Renters Reform Bill to fulfil the 2019 Conservative manifesto commitment to abolish 'no fault' evictions in England
Have they done it though?...
No because they faced a potential rebellion over the ban on no-fault evictions from some Tory MPs, about a fifth of whom are landlords, according to their register of interests
You couldn't make it up
The reform has cross party support
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Post by politician2 on Nov 21, 2023 20:35:15 GMT
Did you read it? It's not particularly anti landlord I did, and my comment was based on the overall tenor of articles (and reader comments) in The Guardian about private landlords, rather than solely on this piece. |
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Post by Lord Emsworth on Nov 21, 2023 21:43:32 GMT
What about no fault evictions and the reform bill not happening?
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Post by politician2 on Nov 21, 2023 21:57:26 GMT
What about no fault evictions and the reform bill not happening? I do not support the no-fault evictions change. Nobody is suggesting that landlords should be able to evict tenants during a lease without a good reason – indeed, they need the approval of a court to do so. What this change would mean is that landlords are compelled to renew leases unless they can get court approval not to do so, which I find astonishing. In almost no other area of contract law can a party be compelled to renew a contract; they can clearly (and rightly) be sued if they breach a contract, but they do not need a court order or have to give a reason to choose not to do further business with the other party once their agreement has expired. And yes, of course I fully understand that some landlords are choosing not to renew contracts for nefarious reasons (because the landlord is refusing to make necessary repairs and a different tenant may be more pliant) but even there I find it odd – why would anybody wish to continue renting from a landlord who is not discharging his responsibilities professionally? |
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Post by Lord Emsworth on Nov 22, 2023 8:52:31 GMT
And yes, of course I fully understand that some landlords are choosing not to renew contracts for nefarious reasons (because the landlord is refusing to make necessary repairs and a different tenant may be more pliant) but even there I find it odd – why would anybody wish to continue renting from a landlord who is not discharging his responsibilities professionally? This shows how out of touch you are There's a chronic shortage of rental properties Everything flows from this No fault evictions are currently going through the roof... www.theguardian.com/society/2023/nov/09/no-fault-evictions-in-england-soaring-out-of-control-say-campaignersYou may not support it but your party does and most MPs do and the Government was elected with a manifesto pledge to legislate against it No surprise the Tories face wipe out This is just one of hundreds of examples of their failure to do anything to improve life for the majority of people in our country Instead they have presided over a shit show By any key metric things have got steadily worse and worse |
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Post by politician2 on Nov 22, 2023 12:51:57 GMT
Of course there's a chronic shortage of rental properties – successive governments have introduced increasingly stringent regulations on landlords, driving many out of the market. Every legislative change that increases landlords' compliance burdens and tips the balance of power even further in favour of tenants will produce another exodus. Demand then outstrips supply and prices go through the roof, which is why your kids are paying silly money for unremarkable properties. You think the solution is further legislation against landlords and rent controls – at which point the supply will dry up almost completely and your kids will struggle to rent anything at any price.
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Post by Lord Emsworth on Nov 22, 2023 14:11:29 GMT
The solution is build more accommodation
Also force owners who leave properties empty for years at a time to tenant them
There are many other things that could be done too
You're completely wrong about number of rental properties
The number of households occupied by private renters in England has increased gradually since 2000. From two million in 2000, the number of households reached 4.61 million in 2022
The balance of power, as you call it, is currently so ludicrously skewed in favour of landlords that the Reform Bill will just slightly redress the balance so that renters are slightly less vulnerable
Responsible landlords would be already doing the basic stuff
It's only the scumbag landlords who would be effected
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Post by politician2 on Nov 22, 2023 14:14:09 GMT
Yes, the long-term solution is certainly to build more. But you're entirely wrong that the balance of power is skewed toward the (residential) landlord – it's the other way round. What makes you think that's the case (apart from having repeatedly read it in The Guardian)?
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Post by Lord Emsworth on Nov 22, 2023 14:37:32 GMT
I rent out my old flat
My wife is legally qualified and works in the sector
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Post by politician2 on Nov 22, 2023 14:57:32 GMT
I've been a landlord for a number of years, and have rented out a number of different properties (though I've scaled down my activities in the last few years).
My view – and I can support this with detailed arguments – is that residential landlord/tenant law is weighted heavily in favour of the tenant.
Not that it's particularly affected me, as I've always had relatively nice tenants and have never had to evict anybody. I've had a few tenants who were quite difficult and needed careful handling, but that comes with any kind of customer service job.
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