Oh dear Mr Shapps! What an ill-conceived comment about housing association “fat cat” pay

Well done Matthew Taylor for defending our sector. If it wasn’t for the affordable housing sector in this country, Shapps would be having a hard job dealing with the hundreds of thousands of homeless throughout the country or the terrible mismanagement of the “slum landlord” element of the private rented sector. Despite a chronic shortage of housing, no government since the immediate post-war period has made it a priority to provide good quality affordable housing in this country.

Public sector social landlords have consistently adapted themselves to the whims of governments and local authorities with the minimum of fuss over the years and continue to deliver a better quality, more sustainable housing stock than any private developer.

Where they lead, private developers are supposed to follow. Unfortunately they often don’t. Mr Shapps should be forcing the private sector to build houses to the same size and sustainability standards as the public sector … now.

Registered social landlords’ profits are re-invested in providing more stock, not paying shareholders. How often do housebuilders go bust on the back of one deal that doesn’t perform as well as expected? Only one or two social landlords have gone the same way.
Steve Hall

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