'bedroom Tax' - Anyone Agree With It?

[Gromit]

The so called 'Bedroom Tax' starts today. Anyone receiving Housing Benefit (HB) who has a spare room will have their HB reduced.

Will it solve the housing shortage?
or
Is it a cynical stealthy way to cut the benefits bill?

[mrs_overall]

Part of me agrees with it - if you have a single person rattling around in a 4 bedroom house when families are waiting for homes then yes.
If we are talking about one spare bedroom, then it is unfair

[emmie]

having roots in the community doesn't mean anything, not now, and one more thing as i already said, it's not as though one hasn't paid rent, council tax in the past, so those who constantly come up with this benefit scrounger lark shouldn't, as some have paid and paid again. Whilst you may agree with downsizing, the powers that be haven't really thought this through, ultimately it will be many families on low incomes who end up having to move, they rent privately, and the cap i believe is 400 quid a week, so have a look at the link i provided at the 1 bed only rents and you might get the drift where this is going.

[emmie]

1 spare room costs you 14 percent loss in housing benefit. That room might be 6 x 6, no matter. Anyway enough as i am tired, feel ill any rate, sure coming down with a bad cold, and now want to bury my head for a time.

[EDDIE51]

naomi , Yes that is exactly the point. If you move to a smaller place the housing benefit will cover all the rent. You lose 14% if you have 1 extra room, 25% if you have 2 .
On another thread I half joking said '' Knock the walls down and make 2 bedrooms into one'' but that has now been suggested as a serious way to reduce the liability. Apparently if you knock down the wall and fill in one door way so you have one large bedroom you can get the house reassesed as a bedroom less. There is no ruling about how large a bedroom can be , so theoretically you could convert even a 4 or 5 bedroom house into a 1 bed house.

[emmie]

suggest that you need to ask the council about this, as they do not let you do alterations of that nature without firm planning permission and that isn't granted often.

[theshedman]

Yes if you move out of a council house and into a smaller private rented one they will pay all the rent even though it may well be £100 a week more than the one you move out of. Can see how that will save them money, lol.

[emmie]

we have little or no rights, and little or no say in any changes to our homes, nor indeed any works the council deems necessary. As a social housing tenant that means they can walk in and rip out your kitchen because it doesn't comply with their rules, regs, or that they are implementing the better homes policy of improvements on bathrooms, kitchens and come along and change it without needing your permission. I know of folk who were told by their local authority this would happen, that they would be doing all the flats kitchens irrespective that you might have put in a pristine 2000 grand kitchen yourself, and one unhappy couple had their ripped out and replaced by a substandard pile of crap. If you think i am having an April fools joke with you, think again. Tenants who have bought their council flats are in an even worse position, i could write a book over that one...

[emmie]

Mrs O, i am not rattling around, except for the tablets i have taken this morning, to combat what feels like the flu coming on.

[LyndaB]

I agree with it in principle, but as many others have said it needs tweaking. However, it's nothing new. I remember a friend who's mum lived in a large council house (4 bedrooms) and when her family left home she had to move to something smaller. No ifs, buts or maybes, she had to move out!

[emmie]

so how does it work, if i find a 1 bedroom place, and it cost 500 quid a week to rent, in the capital it's more than likely, the council are not going to pay that are they, as there is a cap of 400 quid a week on housing benefit as far as i have seen.

[emmie]

Lynda, and where did she move to... and when was this.

[anotheoldgit]

Agree with mrs-overall on this, but it must be remembered that those living in those houses with spare bedrooms don't have to move, the difference being is they are just going to receive less public help with their rent, but after all there are plenty who have to pay a full rent with no help whatsoever,

The housing problem would be greatly reduced if we only had to house our own people instead of half the world's.

I wonder how many bedrooms MP's second homes in London have, perhaps another good idea would be for them to move out of these houses and to be re-accommodated into one bedroomed flats.

[ummmm]

Em, what is keeping you in London?

[LyndaB]

Not sure where she moved to, I think she moved into a flat. It was about 15 years ago

[naomi24]

This clearly hasn’t been thought through properly, but in principle the public purse shouldn’t be paying for people to occupy property they don’t need - especially if they're below pensionable age and fit to work. A ‘spare room’ might be a spare room to some – but it’s a bedroom to a couple of kids who live in overcrowded conditions.