Legislation klaxon

Three new housing Bills were announced for this final year of the current administration by Julie James, Counsel General, on 29th April: homelessness; social housing allocation; and building safety.  The latter I covered in a blog a few weeks ago, and admit that it extends beyond my knowledge as it engages a range of complex, technical, interdisciplinary issues which will make its implementation not uninteresting.  However, more generally, as Will Hayward identified in his substack newsletter last week, “if Labour do nothing meaningful for Wales in the next 12 months, they will be in third place” in the next elections.  He highlighted in that newsletter just how significant the effect of the PiP and social security changes are to Wales: “Wales is 5% the size of England but makes up 40% of the areas hit hardest by Labour’s changes”.  So, that is the context for this legislative programme.

Julie James described the homelessness Bill as changing things so that the system “… is accessible and person centred, enabling those who are homeless to obtain long-term housing quickly, increase their own self-sufficiency, and stay housed” (para 197).

And, in response to the Conservative spokesperson speech she described as pre-prepared and patronising (not going to disagree), Julie James added a strong endorsement for the work on homelessness and social housing allocation:

We are about to introduce the homelessness and social housing allocation (Wales) Bill. This is the most radical change to homelessness provision anywhere in western Europe. You’ve only got to ask any of the housing charities who have worked alongside us on that Bill, or any of the people with lived experience, what their view of that is. So, the very idea that that’s not innovative, new and progressive is for the birds. (para 220)

As I have noted before these are pretty big commitments.  I don’t want to say that they are undeliverable but turning the juggernaut of social housing allocation and homelessness decision-making round is a laudable effort and much-needed.  I have written about this in the English context (very much a love letter to homelessness research, policy, reduction) and experience of things that were hoped to lead to culture change suggests that this will be a slow process in the context of a system which is well-attuned to the understanding of housing need in the context of a lack of social housing (see this article on England with hundred year waiting lists). To adopt the title of one of my favourite pieces of housing research (about discrimination in social housing allocation), this may be about rearranging the deckchairs on the Titanic.  But, then again, I’m an old grump.

Most importantly, the Senedd local government and housing committee has issued advance notification of an open call for evidence on the general principles of the Bill with short notie during the Summer term – watch out for that.