Higher turnover adds to risk of breakdown on council estates
A study supported by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation uncovers a sustained rise in the proportion of council tenants who are moving out each year. This explains why the number of annual lettings to new tenants has remained roughly level since the early 1980s in spite of a 35 per cent reduction in the overall stock of council homes.
Although increases in net turnover can increase the availability of homes for people in need, they add to administrative costs for councils through lost rent and the expense of securing, repairing and re-letting empty property.
Housing turnover is also a recognised barometer of community cohesion, to a point where high rates signal an increased risk of social problems. Residential instability implies a frequent severing of friendship and family ties that contributes directly to social exclusion among young people and adults alike.
The research, to be published in the Foundation's 1998/99 Housing Finance Review, identifies changes in housing policy during the 1990s that gave an 'artificial' boost to turnover. These included financial incentives for tenants to vacate their homes.
Even so, it calculates an underlying increase of 50 per cent between 1990 and 1997 that reflected a growing exodus from council housing into the private sector. Between 1991 and 1995/96, for example, the number of former council tenants moving into owner-occupation or private rents rose by almost 150 per cent (from 33,000 to 76,000).
The study suggests that the increased availability of private rented accommodation and greater affordability of home ownership help to explain these trends - together with substantial real-terms rent rises in many local authority areas. Council tenants were most likely to move into owner-occupation before the mid-1990s. But the greatest number of moves in recent years has been into privately rented accommodation. more follows:
Examining regional data, the analysis highlights significant differences in the rates at which council house turnover has increased since 1990. In the North, rates rose sharply after 1993/94, having previously remained steady. The opposite was true in London where turnover in many boroughs has fallen in recent years. Authorities with the highest rate of increase in local turnover were Maidstone and Croydon in the South, Derby in the Midlands and Copeland in Cumbria.
Data from the Government's Survey of English Housing, meanwhile, showed that a majority of former council tenants who moved to other tenures in 1996/97 had lived in their council homes for less than five years. Nearly a third had moved out within two years of becoming a tenant. However, it also emerged that as many tenants moving into privately rented homes hoped to transfer back into council housing as aspired to move on into owner-occupation.
Hal Pawson, who carried out the research at Heriot-Watt University, said: "The rise in turnover since the late 1970s means there is now a substantial proportion of tenants who move out of the council sector relatively quickly. Either they never saw council housing as a long-term option, or else they were quickly disillusioned. However, it also seems there is a growing group of relatively footloose people who see the private rented and council sectors as more inter-changeable than in the past. It suggests that councils in some parts of the country may be taking on the role traditionally associated with private landlords of a more flexible, short to medium term housing provider. The consequences, in terms of social cohesion and exclusion, are potentially serious and require further study."
