Surveillance Society

The recent event at the Cricket World Cup, with members of the England Cricket Team being caught out drinking and being reported by fans, has surprised some. But why? Britain is fast becoming a surveillance society. There are more CCTV cameras per person than anywhere else. There is a national addiction to mobile phones/cameras. Life in Britain has become one long reality TV experiment, if you're not filming someone, you're probably being filmed.

People report on one another, take photos or film incidents as 'proof'. In Rumania in the past it was thought that one in three people was an informer on their neighbours/friends/families . . . recently released reports from East Germany again demonstrate the extent of people informing on one another. These were people living under difficult circumstances, being coerced by the authorities.

However, what we now see is that coercion is not needed, for Brits at least. The obsession with what other people are doing, or might be doing, is developing a society of spies, telling tales on one another like immature, fearful four year olds.

Holy Housing

Home ownership can provide benefits to people. Being a home-owner can increase the sense of security. For many, owning a home is their one real chance of increasing their personal wealth. Others think that at least they have something to show for their money, compared to renting, which is seen by some as simply ‘throwing money away.’

Yet while home ownership in Britain is increasing, many people believe that Britain is in the middle of a housing crisis. In the face of unprecedented housing wealth – estimated to be £3.4 trillion (a trebling over the last 10 years), we need to ask why

• Owner-occupation is the most common tenure of people living in poverty
• 7% of homeowners do not find home ownership affordable
• Personal unsecured debt in Britain is twice the European average
• Debt in Britain has increased by 118% over the past 10 years
• Birth rates in Britain are continuing to fall
• 54% of people would leave Britain if they could
• While we may be richer we are less happy than we were

Successive governments have overseen and encouraged an irresponsible and unsustainable housing market. The deregulation of the financial services industry has meant that people can take on more debt than ever before. The sale of council houses has lead to a severe shortage of quality, secure rented accommodation. This coupled with the stigmatisation of renting has promoted home-ownership as the only real choice and this has further increased demand for houses to buy. The perception of a house as an investment, rather than a home, has in turn created a skewed and unrealistic attitude towards wealth-creation. People are desperate to get on the housing ladder and are fearful of being left behind.

The impact will be greatest on the children of today as they grow up into adulthood. Those with little or no housing wealth will be so seriously disadvantaged that it is unlikely that they will be able to work themselves out of the situation. This means that it will be even harder for children from poorer backgrounds to get on in life. It is now becoming clear that the divide between those with high levels of housing wealth and those without is reaching the level of disparity in Victorian times.

Home Sweat Home

From a nation of shop-owners to a nation of homeowners. A property-owning democracy has been a seriously determined policy of all British Governments since Thatcher. While some may be making huge profits from the under-regulated and unsustainable housing industry, many other ordinary people are over-burdened with debt, and yet others have no hope of ever owning their own home or even finding somewhere secure and decent to rent.

Looking at the state of housing in Britain today, it is wise to ask - if homeownership is a universal good why is it that:

• Half of Britain’s poor live in owner-occupied homes?
• One-third of owner-occupied homes in England fail to meet the Decent Homes Standard?
• Average debt owed by every UK adult is approximately £26,525?
• Homelessness has doubled since 1997?
  

Changes in the financial services industry have enabled people to take on more debt than ever before, fuelling the upward spiral of house prices.

In addition Government subsidies have encouraged home-ownership at the expense of investment in council and other affordable rented homes. An estimated £40 billion has been siphoned off from the sale of local authority housing, and has not been reinvested in homes. For many people the lack of alternative housing means that there is no choice but to take on mortgage debt, whatever the cost.

Britain is fast becoming a country whose people are increasingly divided by housing wealth, with the gap between rich and poor greater than Victorian times. Is this the Britain we want?

For individuals, the impact of housing debt (mortgage), is leading to longer working hours, longer commuting, increased stress and damage to personal well-being and family life. This isn't good for individuals, for families or for society.