Group's recent pamphlet
Socialist Organiser1982 1982-09-30Read it in the scan (PDF), scan page 7 →
Read from the scan by machine and not corrected: expect misread words, and now and then a caption or a line from a neighbouring story. For anything you quote, read the scan.
Scan page 7
It was good to see you giving prominence, a few weeks ago, to the Labour Housing Group's recent pamphlet on housing finance. The pamphlet does give some clear guidance through the labyrinth of housing finance; my only complaint is that it probably adopts too much of a 'housingprofessional' ; and too little of a political, approach.
A number of points really need to be emphasised: 1. The Labour Party has for years failed to tackle the existence of gross division and inequality between two classes of housing provision: owner-occupation, and the rest. housing provision: owneroccupation, and the rest.
It is a far more profound social division than any other - more so even than the division between private and state education.
determines lifestyle, borrowing ability, control over immediate environment, freedom to move, and political allegiance. It divides British society totally, and what's more balances it against Any amount of improvement and expansion of the Council-owned sector -however desirable - will not solve the problem. Any socialist government worth its salt has to tackle the privileges of the ownerfor tax relief on mortgages at £25,000. 3. The government has also, however, launched a war against the Council sector of housing. The increases they have demanded in rents - and the resultant reductions in subsidy have been punitive on tenants.
Profit
Most local authorities (fortunately not Islington, yet) have seen their Housing Revenue Accounts move into profit as a result: which means that tenants are not only paying for their own housing, but are actually subsidising ratepayers as well. 4. The government really does seem intent On reducing Council housing