Social rented housing is the only genuinely affordable housing in the UK, as rents are tied to local incomes. So why, then, do we lose more social homes through sales and demolitions than are built every year?
That’s the question sparked by our new analysis of government data, which has revealed that social rents are 64% more affordable than private rents, with social tenants paying on average £828 less per month than those renting from a private landlord.
The answer, of course, is the absence of political will. Governments have not prioritised building social homes for decades, and have allowed private renting to become bloated and dysfunctional. Together, these factors have left us with a housing emergency.
