well they shouldn't, i own my own house, and have friends in social housing, and they're lovely, they should ignore them, theyre not worth bothering about, let alone feeling marginalised by such bigots
The fact that people still alive today in Britain have lived in houses without running hot water, electricity or inside toilets reminds me of how far we have come in such a short space of time.
For me that lack of work ethic and personal responsibility, and the sense of entitlement, is the major difference between newer generations and our grandparents generations who lived through the world wars and had no NHS, poor housing and no welfare. They are the generations that built Britain, all of us who came after are pussies in comparison.
I would like to see a return of mass council house building, the priority of which given to workers and retirees. Houses and flats in the UK are at present far too expensive to buy and the current model of renting privately is crap and insecure.
Thank you for this insight in to the past,I remember moving from a cold dark,verry damp house in Oldham,in to a brand new three bedroomed council house,hot water,bath,nice kitchen,I was only six but still verry sharp in my memorie ,the coal man,the bread man,even the mineral man if mum was flushed,saspirella ha,yes it was still cold upstairs in winter times,being in norther Britain but we were now posh.
Council housing Definitely has a place in the modern world. I've noticed that new buildings for private sale are almost always 3 bed and larger because the builders make more money on the sale. What we are not getting is homes for single people or couples....one bed flats for example. This is where the councils could help. Lower rents is a necessity for hard working single people as private rents take all their money. I feel the needs have changed, families can get help with rent whereas single people are not helped as much. Imagine, you are divorced, you look at bedsits for £950 per month, which they are where I live in Suffolk, you work full time on minimum wage......see the problem?
Totally see. I worked as a single person as a HCA for NHS full time. My rent was 525 for a two up two down terrace. It was lovely mind but that with the bills and owning a car soon mounted up. Didnt have big expenditures even like TV or their packages. I needed loans or credit for unexpected life events as I was living to my wage limit. Now in a one bed flat, cheaper in every way and 350 a month next to the hospital I hope to work in (when I recover fully from this spinal surgery) Its a blessing as I would have some financial freedom and play for if/when I do my RN training one day. But I also panic that the rental extortion racket will hit here and rent will go up.
D & R FC @ 17:01! Up Daggers! Thanks so much for posting this. I have lived for the past ten years in a government assisted but privately owned and managed "apartment community" (flats) about two hours from New York. These flats are a godsend for old pensioners like me as the cost of living in this area has risen so sharply that many of us find that our pensions and private retirement accounts, no matter how well we planned, cannot keep up with it all. It seems to me that the local private ownership coupled with government support is working for the time being. There has been interest from speculators in buying this community and converting it to upscale condos for the weekend crowd from New York. It is only our government mandate that every town have units of "affordable housing" that holds this off. Cheers from New England. And, oh yes, once again @17:01: D & R FC, Up Daggers!
Very good documentary. The NYC 'projects' followed along much the same line. About the history of NYCHA article explains: "Public housing was trumpeted as the duty of progressive government, and the swift construction of sprawling complexes became a slum-clearing machine that reshaped the city’s urban landscape. But Nycha developments were not poorhouses: Unlike other cities, New York effectively barred lower-income residents from public housing. From 1953 to 1968, it excluded most residents on welfare by screening applicants using a list of moral factors, including alcoholism, irregular work history, single motherhood and lack of furniture. "
The gentleman at 29.56 is so right. I signed my tenency in 1986. I lived here with my ex husband and split up 4 years later where I was left with two children and no child support. I was able to manage due to housing benefit and family tax credits until both kids were teenagers where I worked full time and was able to be self sufficient. I'm 50 now and my son and daughter inlaw live here with their child. It's a clear case of a family living in a house that they have a right to and who use it the right way. My son wants to move on now but cannot afford a mortgage so will have to have private rental. Very sad. Imagine if they could have this house and I could move into a one bedroom flat rented from the council. Unable to do this though because if they ever had the tenancy they would only get a short lease so I can't take that risk. So here I will be in a 3 bed house just me!! I need to keep the house in case my kids get evicted from a private landlord who wants to sell. Quite sad really.
Tanya Bennett You have had a house which you have not paid for; you have been paid by the taxpayers. You are lucky. It's not sad that you cannot hand on you tenancy, it's right. If you are on your own in a 3 bed house you should be kicked out. I have had a MORTGAGE I have WORKED for. I can hand my house on to my kids. I have paid for your house. I don't believe you have the right to hand the council house you are lining in to your kids.
Suilven Mountain I think you'll find that Tanya has paid for her house, she has paid for it every single week since 1986. That's 29 years, and at 1986 housing prices, she would have paid off a mortgage by now. So you can go and piss up a rope.
KB Quinnell so Tanya has had subsidised housing for nearly 30 years which she has not had to maintain and has the audacity to suggest she should pass it on to her children!!!!!! What a funny world we live in!
Suilven Mountain "Subsidised"? I think you'll find she will have paid far more than the house cost to build. Council house maintenance is not performed by the council unless it's something like roof tiles coming off - Carpets, wallpaper, the painting, and any improvements or modernizations are the de facto responsibility of the tenant. Because of this, what you call a "subsidized" home will actually have been providing profit for decades. She has paid her rent well in excess of a mortgage. She looks after her house. This house was not provided in an attempt to screw the tenant out of as much money as possible, but to provide a home at a sensible cost - which the private property market could not and can not. Therefore only an unhinged person who uses too many exclamation marks would presume to tell her what she should be able to do with her home.
I live in a new town and half the houses are owned where I live if you want a council house in my area just forget it and they where all council houses
The issue with housing now lies in the fact that international buyers buy property in the centre of London, multiple properties in fact.. and rarely stay there, as they're too busy doing business elsewhere. This trickles down and makes buying properties much more difficult for the working class... so then they settle for housing that barely meets their basic needs. People born in this country who are working class, asylum seekers, the disabled and mentally unwell should be prioritised over on the housing list. International buyers should have limits and be monitored for their housing, as they are the ones who strategically destroy the values of the working class, British citizen. The government are evidently greedy, money-mongering bastards who's soul aim is to put value on the international millionaires and not of it's own people.
@Western Unity Not sure if you have read the statistics but the UK had barely allowed any Syrian asylum seekers in the UK compared to countries like Turkey ... must be a topic of proximity but not when it comes to foreign war mongers wanting to live in mansions, in central London.
how could we allow this; by building al these terrible building we have destroyed the landscape of many cities. I am not against council houses, but they should be destroyed and rebuilt, just to look nicer.
Generations are now growing up living with their parents if they are lucky. There will be a tiny UK population in the future because they can't afford to have a family home or children.
The young turks news claim half of the European population under 30 live at home with parents And many people i know are living with people to make the rent cheaper Shared housing etc I have heard stories of 5 people buying together just to get on the property ladder our country the UK or even England is in a mess
clairemcheskin .. "can't afford to have a family home or children" you hit the nail right on the head with this, but this is the aim of our present government. They don't want the poor and needy, only the wealthy and uber wealthy, especially here in London with their Social Cleansing happening full on ....
I really enjoyed this documentary - although it does make me angry at the mess we are in today with regards to housing (that people have to pay through the roof (excuse the pun) to live in poorly constructed tiny boxes). Likewise, to think of the wider social implications of the way living spaces are designed is very poignant today when unfortunately public space is becoming more and more privatised. The individual stories were lovely. Although it is an absolutely tragedy what we have lost - it does shows what we are capable of as a society - the sum of the collective far greater than its parts.
Paul Sudbury @ 24:30 is totally correct about too much anonymity today, & what he said goes for the US as well, When I was 8 my family moved from Troy NY {a small city North of Albany} to Phx AZ. We knew every kid on our block in Troy & as Sudbury said every Mom knew us. We were just as likely to get reprimanded from one of the other Mothers as our own, so no matter where you were you knew someone was watching what you were up to. Kids today don't know that kind of safety. We were less likely to act up or do something because it was 'cool' or we felt pressured- we could say, "Oh I would but so & so's Mom is watching us." In many ways Troy is still like that & my cousins who remained in Troy don't know how lucky they are for their kids to have that. Try to reprimand a kid in Phx & you're likely to get into it with the parent.
The closing minutes of this great piece of documentary, show the dilemma of the British working class and its decimation at the receiving end of attacks from both right and left-wing ideologues. Thatcher and her 'right to buy' (which has resulted in a massive sell-on to private landlords and their inflated rents); then the socialist globalism of Labour whose policies have effectively excluded the sons and daughters of the original tenants, from following them. They find that they are at the bottom of a very long list of those 'more in need' - shorthand for not British.
Your last point is extremely pertinent but I suspect it was painstakingly avoided by the makers of the documentary. As such, I found wanting and cowardly.
@52:04.. ANORAK!! Have the best memories of life on a council estate, but I left just at the time it first started to unravel.. t'was a grand time...parafin heaters and all..
The Tori government in the 1980's selling off the public housing units to the people who lived there who could afford them was the only thing left to do for them...at least some the people would be able to have enough some money to move should they have chosen to sold their Unit. In the late 1970s a little known fact mentioned in the end of this film is that the LABOR government got rid of the restrictions that kept these places nice in the first place.(Had to have a job, had to keep up the place, no Class restrictions and preference) In favor of housing the homeless and on the basis of need..the latter being Entirely Open to Interpretation and abuse. It is not the government that ruins these neighborhoods. It the Quality of people that live there and the attitudes they hold towards their home. Unfortunatly once a new demographic moves in and takes over the majority of housing that doesnt care or is not held to the same standard that previous residents were and feel no sense of responsibility or obligation to the upkeep of the area. We all know what comes next... Crime, Broken homes, Drugs, Teen Pregnancys, gangs, and eventually lower Property value resulting in the entire Property being bought by a land developer, and torn down Or run as a slum. It's happening in America on an Industrial scale. And It's either good or bad Depending On who you ask.... The city I lived near had its two main avenue and street go from being boarded up, Drug/Gang/Crime Infested shitholes to high end safe Economically stable Areas in just 15 short years. -When you Burn things Down -New things grow. Its a sad thing to see. Alot of those people that life in these community seem Like Solid, Honest, People.
The problem is government representatives are the landowners who are in turn bleeding the system and the public dry to line thier pockets why wouldn't they because they have a vested interest in the housing crisis.
I think the ideal of social housing is a great one, and one that should be pursued. It kind of is pursued still is to a degree (see the Bedzed complex in Beddington) but its not being pushed forward enough because of greedy developers and polticians, but also because I think people look back on the government social housing movements in 20th century as massive errors. But it wasn't all failure, as this programme shows. Limit tenant buying and build more council houses!
I am pretty sure that people who want a council house are vetted to see if they are suitable for it, they get it through the housing waiting list. Unions are much weaker today then they used to be and things are getting worse because of it.
pink Candy .. quite true .. I could never live in a high rise block say on the 20th floor. I definitely would constantly feel really uneasy, I get vertigo. My youngest daughter lived in a high rise over South London, though she was only on the 7th floor. One day when I visited her she took me up to the top floor as I wanted to see what the view looked like. After a brief look I had to step back, the street, buildings down below was like looking at a model village, it also made me feel really weird and queasy ....
God I could'nt live in a tower block I wouldn't be able to go too near the windows and look out it made me queasy just watching them on this. I like the look of that semi circle block of fats.
I used to live in a ten story one, top floor. I remember one time I peeked out from the window; I could see the cable running across the wall straight to the pavement. XD Scariest millisecond in my life. But still it was some of the fondest time in my memory :)
" Whoa loads of sky dishes" I thought the same thing. Why weren't the dish people forced to put in common dishes and cable from them to the apartments?
Anaïs Petitjean if you're watching on a phone/ tablet you can click the 3 dots on the top right hand corner of the video and click captions then click English.
I have heard Bob Crow talk a lot more sense than any conservative, I have recently got a council property I was made homeless by my uncle I was placed in band 3.
The tories are letting in all these immigrants and not enough money is being spent on benefits,council housing,infrastructure,defense and important things like that.
This announcer is nuts in the closed communities of the super rich you have to keep your place up to standard. If the super rich have to live up to a standard what the middle class cant keep the place looking decent. Crazy man!
+soldier person Sorta I think. In the US federal housing is based on income. Currently they want medium income families to move in them because to many pay so little rent the federal government cant afford to keep them fixed up. I am one of those medium income persons. I pay the maximum flat rate and frankly I am moving. These people are nasty fuckers. You constantly battle roaches and bedbugs. There is no advantage to living in these unless there is a housing shortage.
Reuben Stern Big Pharma only exist in one country and that is America. All other counties have socialized medicine and have very specific laws to protect it. Drug reps are illegal and advertisement for prescription medications is illegal in print and television ads. Now the cosmetic and natural medicine camps do exactly the same thing the pharmaceutical industries do. The majority of medication used every day have never been tested they were grandfathered in during the formation of the FDA. They rely only on clinical observation as to effect.
1, we have all the big pharma companies here, GSK, Pfizer and even Monsanto, they are international, so big they influence governments all over the world. That' how they got the name big pharma... 2. why did you just come out with that?
Reuben Stern Because its the truth. In socialized medicine the government takes bids from pharm companies. This is why medication is under a third of the cost than it is in America . Come to America and shit your pants at the price of our medications.
+keith “yoro 70” parkhill My sister was prescribed a medicine that cost almost $200 per pill, she couldn't afford it. If there isn't any generic form of a drug available, a pharmaceutical company can jack up the price as high as they want to. Their excuse is that America has to burden the costs of the research and development for the medicines, I guess because we have no other choice, or we're the only ones dumb enough to pay those prices without rioting in the streets for a change - and we have no say-so in a runaway government entirety controlled by corporations and international bankers. America is fucked - and fucked up!
Is housing of the working classes act 1885 the act you are referring to? I have not heard of it before and I know a lot about things like this. I don't think there is any evidence of unemployed having priority over people with jobs. Things have been going down hill ever since Thatcher attacked the unions.
Um, the Cabrini project in Chicago (which preceded Britain's "experiement) was exactly this type of massive high-rise equivalent of your "Council" buildings. It was a disaster. Come to think of it, the Ozzies did the same thing in Sydney and "council" buildings were going up in Brussels the last time I was there. All that results from this type of "beneficial" project is a high-rise, crime-ridden slum with a remarkable murder rate (usually by tossing people off the top floors). Still, would any of these other countries ask if it works? What, ask Americans...
Yelirhs Sewns no, the conditions are worse in America. Not good either place but there’s more of a system in UK that serves better the people. Hard to believe but very true.
@@jlh8830 Are YOU sure about that? Did you ever visit the "projects" in Chicago before they tore them down? They made these homes look like Buckingham Palace. The TV show in the '70's called "Good Times" attempted to show how run down and dangerous these neighborhoods in Chicago had become... in less than 20 years! Today they are gone and the poor have been displaced all over Chicago's southside.
Dutchman Kamstra Public housing in America varies from one place to the next the same as it does in The UK. Some people are placed in beautiful homes in suburban neighborhoods others are placed in more “urban” neighborhoods. However in America unlike the UK if you are a married couple you will not get benefits nor will you get public housing despite having children. If you are a single adult in America and you do not have a disability that prevents you from working or children you will not get public assistance or housing. Lastly despite what you hear in the media you must be an American citizen to receive benefits or housing.
where did it go wrong?well for a start maggie sold them all off...and now there not buiding anymore we have no houses,if they had spent the money on doing them up,half the country would have somewhere too live,even the high rises could have been used for single people ot mabe the homeless who im sure would love somewhere to live...makes me sick,on estates 5 out of 30 are council now, the rest are privatly owned...
Plus, it's better to pay rent to some middle class cunt then the government, who will just spend it on questionable wars and give it to their rich friends in the form of overpriced contracts and subsidies...
council housing was built in the first place so that people who could not afford to own their own home would have somewhere decent to live...and if those places still existed there would still be a flux of housing still available..as it was people brought them cheap and sold for a substantial profit..maggie thatcher was the ruin of this country with her grand ideas...and now the people are still suffering for from her lack of clarity.Yes there is a green belt ..i agree ,but the rent from those houses that were still inhabited by council tenants would have gone to buy up other propertys to use for social housing...in every steet in the citys there are houses in dilapidatied states that will fall down before they can repair them,
The council houses ended up being dilapidated. When you don't own something, you have much less incentive to look after it. It was easier to reward the people who did look after them with houses, than to fix them up,p, and for them to become dilapidated once again...
Liam Abrahams no my friend the failure was the management of the housing organisations they were privatised and dint care who lived in a house as long as they got money ... from managing people and teaching the m as they move up the chain we bunched all the shite in with the good
23:08 That sounds like the actor Leslie Howard narrating but it appears to be the man in the pinstriped suit @ 24:39 (all posh English people sounded the same then) - does anyone know where that archive film is from?
I've never understood council housing. I'm still not sure if it is the same as US public housing or more like private housing under a residence agency or community contract. US public housing was always for poor people, and always badly done and badly maintained. After WWII, many tracts of small single homes and duplexes were built for the soldiers and their new families. These were always sold, with no overseeing council. Interesting.
You're probably thinking of Levittown. Levitt built all over, New Jersey (now called Willingboro), Long Island, Puerto Rico and Pennsylvania for instance. They were cheap and filled a need for the 12 million veterans coming home and getting on with their long delayed life stages, a wife, a home, a decent job and children. As for the public housing I don't think there was a time when they weren't filled with people on welfare recipients and people who were too familiar with the precinct and the court system. They were all built in the most crime ridden neighborhoods which incredibly became even more crime ridden.The first one I remember was built on the grounds of Ebbets Field where the Brooklyn Dodgers had played before they left for Los Angeles. It was a no go from the start. I worked in lots of them as a telephone installer with New York Telephone in the South Bronx. You didn't dare stay there after dark but the days weren't much better. Here in Charlotte I had a service call at night in one of the worst ones. I was working in a terminal when a salt and pepper cop team came by in their cruiser and wanted to know why I was there at night and by myself. "Even we don't come here alone and at night" said one. By the 1990s I refused to work in them any more. Too many crack dealers with guns. Worse was the crack addicts needing money for crack. I worked in Miami in a place called Liberty City. I quit after I became a witness to a murder and had to testify. A guy had pulled up with a shotgun and shot his girl friend and her boyfriend in her car right through the windshield. These council houses were built way better and the original tenants were good hard working people. Filling them with people on subsidies killed the places.
I'm not sure how or where you got this information about US public housing. Have you lived in the US? Yes, some housing is far less than ideal, but there are many types of housing earmarked for many different people in different situations. Not all these people are poor; however, many are. There's Section 8 Housing, which is often highly monitored and the properties, houses and apartments, are inspected and have to pass inspection in order for the landlord to receive the portion of the rent from the government. It is subsidized housing, but Section 8 is not the only subsidized housing provider. There is housing especially for people who have mental illness, addiction issues, developmental disabilities, physical disabilities. Yes, like all countries, the US has its housing problems, but generally the housing there is far better than housing in the UK. I know; I lived in the US for over 39 years. I have now been in England 10 years too long and have been living in its unfair and substandard housing!!!
What's to understand?! What happened in the UK was that the poor ended up living in slum conditions. Slums meant, for example, no running water inside houses, large families occupying 2 room premises, and a toilet shared by up to an entire street. Presumably those properties were owned by landlords and rented at minimal rates. It was a situation not tolerable in the (at the time) world's richest nation. So, the slums were compulsorily purchased by the state and demolished. In their place, modern and more comfortable housing was constructed (and owned) by the local government, and leased to those in need for affordable rents: council houses. Much later (in the 1980s) most of this housing stock was sold off, reflecting a higher general standard of living, though some still remains in the hands of quangos.
Robert Cuminale I’ve lived in New York much of my life, while I agree with much of what you said I would also like to mention there are suburban areas in Queens and Long Island that are majority section 8 homes and they are in very nice neighborhoods. My parents purchased one such home in the 1970s. Now I will mention that unlike the UK the homes in the US that are in suburban areas are more than likely privately owned and they simply accept section 8 funding. But some are also owned by the city of New York
pfft .. creepy presenter's clothing and apparel evidently more drab-looking than most of the housing he's covering while peddling social engineering (e.g., many of his introductory assumptions he utters to his guests and hosts) .. tut tut
Its not that someone else pays its that everyone pays everyone contributes to the pot and it is spilt equally between the people, providing universal housing education, health care etc. etc. providing the best to everyone regardless of class or wealth and paid for by everyone. It benefits everyone god bless socialism.
+utubevidyo it is subsidized housing PERIOD, if it wasn't it would be called PRIVATE. It is not. BTW even at 50 pounds per month, you get 12,000 pounds of subsidies over a 20 years period paid by fellow citizens. Just keep lying to yourself
garybsg Well that is true, but not everyone is capable of paying taxes. From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs. If you have the ability to pay you should for you are helping people less well off than yourself, but you should know that at any time you find yourself in need then the collective taxes of the many will help you too. Now go and pump your selfish bullshit on someone else.
+ejcmoorhouse Yes my Marxist comrade I see your point. However, people who are less well off are suppose to change their life to be better off not turn into parasites. Socialist rules: #1. I need something, I take it from someone else because I need it. #2 After stealing someone else's money then mumble some collective bullshit like "compassionate society or social good" #3 Get angry at people who point out you are parasitic scumbag
Gardens at each home? Why--that's just like taking food from the mouths of the children of professional farmers! What an outrage! Where are the agricultural lobbyists?
Social housing was a great idea because of Socialist influence. During the 20th Century everyone in Europe was guaranteed a roof over their heads till some short sighted politicians and greedy fat cats dissolved it. People nowadays are more likely to struggle and some one is making money out of it no wonder we have massive social problems and breakdowns in UK and EU bring back social living standards.
People are ashamed today to say they live in social housing.They are made to feel like a failure if they do not own there own home.
well they shouldn't, i own my own house, and have friends in social housing, and they're lovely, they should ignore them, theyre not worth bothering about, let alone feeling marginalised by such bigots
This is a superb documentary. What a tragedy!? To think how revolutionary and innovative the councils housing projects actually were...
The fact that people still alive today in Britain have lived in houses without running hot water, electricity or inside toilets reminds me of how far we have come in such a short space of time.
My mom grew up that way. For years they got water from an outside pump!
For me that lack of work ethic and personal responsibility, and the sense of entitlement, is the major difference between newer generations and our grandparents generations who lived through the world wars and had no NHS, poor housing and no welfare. They are the generations that built Britain, all of us who came after are pussies in comparison.
I would like to see a return of mass council house building, the priority of which given to workers and retirees. Houses and flats in the UK are at present far too expensive to buy and the current model of renting privately is crap and insecure.
Yep me too. Its the same situation in Ireland as well. It's one of the reasons why there are now so many homeless people in Ireland today.
+Generation Renter Why the fuck do people put up with the rich getting richer off your back and the taxpayer??
I love programmes like this. Thanks for the upload.
Thank you for this insight in to the past,I remember moving from a cold dark,verry damp house in Oldham,in to a brand new three bedroomed council house,hot water,bath,nice kitchen,I was only six but still verry sharp in my memorie ,the coal man,the bread man,even the mineral man if mum was flushed,saspirella ha,yes it was still cold upstairs in winter times,being in norther Britain but we were now posh.
Council housing Definitely has a place in the modern world. I've noticed that new buildings for private sale are almost always 3 bed and larger because the builders make more money on the sale. What we are not getting is homes for single people or couples....one bed flats for example. This is where the councils could help. Lower rents is a necessity for hard working single people as private rents take all their money. I feel the needs have changed, families can get help with rent whereas single people are not helped as much.
Imagine, you are divorced, you look at bedsits for £950 per month, which they are where I live in Suffolk, you work full time on minimum wage......see the problem?
Totally see.
I worked as a single person as a HCA for NHS full time. My rent was 525 for a two up two down terrace. It was lovely mind but that with the bills and owning a car soon mounted up. Didnt have big expenditures even like TV or their packages. I needed loans or credit for unexpected life events as I was living to my wage limit.
Now in a one bed flat, cheaper in every way and 350 a month next to the hospital I hope to work in (when I recover fully from this spinal surgery) Its a blessing as I would have some financial freedom and play for if/when I do my RN training one day. But I also panic that the rental extortion racket will hit here and rent will go up.
D & R FC @ 17:01! Up Daggers! Thanks so much for posting this. I have lived for the past ten years in a government assisted but privately owned and managed "apartment community" (flats) about two hours from New York. These flats are a godsend for old pensioners like me as the cost of living in this area has risen so sharply that many of us find that our pensions and private retirement accounts, no matter how well we planned, cannot keep up with it all. It seems to me that the local private ownership coupled with government support is working for the time being. There has been interest from speculators in buying this community and converting it to upscale condos for the weekend crowd from New York. It is only our government mandate that every town have units of "affordable housing" that holds this off. Cheers from New England. And, oh yes, once again @17:01: D & R FC, Up Daggers!
Thanks for uploading this - I watched it by accident on TV and was looking for it, as it sums it all up!
Very good documentary. The NYC 'projects' followed along much the same line. About the history of NYCHA article explains:
"Public housing was trumpeted as the duty of progressive government, and the swift construction of sprawling complexes became a slum-clearing machine that reshaped the city’s urban landscape.
But Nycha developments were not poorhouses: Unlike other cities, New York effectively barred lower-income residents from public housing. From 1953 to 1968, it excluded most residents on welfare by screening applicants using a list of moral factors, including alcoholism, irregular work history, single motherhood and lack of furniture.
"
The gentleman at 29.56 is so right. I signed my tenency in 1986. I lived here with my ex husband and split up 4 years later where I was left with two children and no child support. I was able to manage due to housing benefit and family tax credits until both kids were teenagers where I worked full time and was able to be self sufficient. I'm 50 now and my son and daughter inlaw live here with their child. It's a clear case of a family living in a house that they have a right to and who use it the right way. My son wants to move on now but cannot afford a mortgage so will have to have private rental. Very sad. Imagine if they could have this house and I could move into a one bedroom flat rented from the council. Unable to do this though because if they ever had the tenancy they would only get a short lease so I can't take that risk. So here I will be in a 3 bed house just me!! I need to keep the house in case my kids get evicted from a private landlord who wants to sell. Quite sad really.
Tanya Bennett You have had a house which you have not paid for; you have been paid by the taxpayers. You are lucky. It's not sad that you cannot hand on you tenancy, it's right. If you are on your own in a 3 bed house you should be kicked out.
I have had a MORTGAGE I have WORKED for. I can hand my house on to my kids.
I have paid for your house. I don't believe you have the right to hand the council house you are lining in to your kids.
Suilven Mountain I think you'll find that Tanya has paid for her house, she has paid for it every single week since 1986. That's 29 years, and at 1986 housing prices, she would have paid off a mortgage by now.
So you can go and piss up a rope.
Thank you KB Quinnell!
KB Quinnell so Tanya has had subsidised housing for nearly 30 years which she has not had to maintain and has the audacity to suggest she should pass it on to her children!!!!!! What a funny world we live in!
Suilven Mountain "Subsidised"? I think you'll find she will have paid far more than the house cost to build.
Council house maintenance is not performed by the council unless it's something like roof tiles coming off - Carpets, wallpaper, the painting, and any improvements or modernizations are the de facto responsibility of the tenant. Because of this, what you call a "subsidized" home will actually have been providing profit for decades.
She has paid her rent well in excess of a mortgage. She looks after her house. This house was not provided in an attempt to screw the tenant out of as much money as possible, but to provide a home at a sensible cost - which the private property market could not and can not.
Therefore only an unhinged person who uses too many exclamation marks would presume to tell her what she should be able to do with her home.
I live in a new town and half the houses are owned where I live if you want a council house in my area just forget it and they where all council houses
The issue with housing now lies in the fact that international buyers buy property in the centre of London, multiple properties in fact.. and rarely stay there, as they're too busy doing business elsewhere.
This trickles down and makes buying properties much more difficult for the working class... so then they settle for housing that barely meets their basic needs. People born in this country who are working class, asylum seekers, the disabled and mentally unwell should be prioritised over on the housing list.
International buyers should have limits and be monitored for their housing, as they are the ones who strategically destroy the values of the working class, British citizen. The government are evidently greedy, money-mongering bastards who's soul aim is to put value on the international millionaires and not of it's own people.
@Western Unity Not sure if you have read the statistics but the UK had barely allowed any Syrian asylum seekers in the UK compared to countries like Turkey ... must be a topic of proximity but not when it comes to foreign war mongers wanting to live in mansions, in central London.
Both a beautiful insight and a very sad story.
how could we allow this; by building al these terrible building we have destroyed the landscape of many cities. I am not against council houses, but they should be destroyed and rebuilt, just to look nicer.
Council housing needs to be expanded. This time pay to maintain it. If you don’t maintain something it turns to shit.
British Television, Best in the World. fascinating documentary here in Boston our "Public Housing failed long , long ago.
Generations are now growing up living with their parents if they are lucky. There will be a tiny UK population in the future because they can't afford to have a family home or children.
The young turks news claim half of the European population under 30 live at home with parents
And many people i know are living with people to make the rent cheaper
Shared housing etc
I have heard stories of 5 people buying together just to get on the property ladder our country the UK or even England is in a mess
clairemcheskin .. "can't afford to have a family home or children" you hit the nail right on the head with this, but this is the aim of our present government. They don't want the poor and needy, only the wealthy and uber wealthy, especially here in London with their Social Cleansing happening full on ....
Thank you for these memories..lived in Neath Gardens,,and Parkland Grange...:)
Enjoyed it very much. Thank you for taking the time to upload it.
I really enjoyed this documentary - although it does make me angry at the mess we are in today with regards to housing (that people have to pay through the roof (excuse the pun) to live in poorly constructed tiny boxes). Likewise, to think of the wider social implications of the way living spaces are designed is very poignant today when unfortunately public space is becoming more and more privatised. The individual stories were lovely. Although it is an absolutely tragedy what we have lost - it does shows what we are capable of as a society - the sum of the collective far greater than its parts.
This all seems like a very long time ago, but the living memories of the lucky inhabitants puts it more like the day before yesterday.
Great documentary, thanks for this
My old man's a dustman. He wears a dustman's hat. He wears cor blimey trousers and he lives in the Council flat.
Paul Sudbury @ 24:30 is totally correct about too much anonymity today, & what he said goes for the US as well, When I was 8 my family moved from Troy NY {a small city North of Albany} to Phx AZ.
We knew every kid on our block in Troy & as Sudbury said every Mom knew us. We were just as likely to get reprimanded from one of the other Mothers as our own, so no matter where you were you knew someone was watching what you were up to. Kids today don't know that kind of safety. We were less likely to act up or do something because it was 'cool' or we felt pressured- we could say, "Oh I would but so & so's Mom is watching us." In many ways Troy is still like that & my cousins who remained in Troy don't know how lucky they are for their kids to have that. Try to reprimand a kid in Phx & you're likely to get into it with the parent.
My autie bought her council house in 1981 she paid £3250 for it and sold it 4 years later for £35,000.
Interesting documentary. They must have known that Liverpool, not London built the first council housing though.
The closing minutes of this great piece of documentary, show the dilemma of the British working class and its decimation at the receiving end of attacks from both right and left-wing ideologues. Thatcher and her 'right to buy' (which has resulted in a massive sell-on to private landlords and their inflated rents); then the socialist globalism of Labour whose policies have effectively excluded the sons and daughters of the original tenants, from following them. They find that they are at the bottom of a very long list of those 'more in need' - shorthand for not British.
Your last point is extremely pertinent but I suspect it was painstakingly avoided by the makers of the documentary. As such, I found wanting and cowardly.
Thanks for uploading!
@52:04.. ANORAK!!
Have the best memories of life on a council estate, but I left just at the time it first started to unravel.. t'was a grand time...parafin heaters and all..
It's a pity we don't have any real men like unwin he had respect and cared about the working class,
The Tori government in the 1980's selling off the public housing units to the people who lived there who could afford them was the only thing left to do for them...at least some the people would be able to have enough some money to move should they have chosen to sold their Unit.
In the late 1970s a little known fact mentioned in the end of this film is that the LABOR government got rid of the restrictions that kept these places nice in the first place.(Had to have a job, had to keep up the place, no Class restrictions and preference)
In favor of housing the homeless and on the basis of need..the latter being Entirely Open to Interpretation and abuse.
It is not the government that ruins these neighborhoods. It the Quality of people that live there and the attitudes they hold towards their home.
Unfortunatly once a new demographic moves in and takes over the majority of housing that doesnt care or is not held to the same standard that previous residents were and feel no sense of responsibility or obligation to the upkeep of the area.
We all know what comes next...
Crime, Broken homes, Drugs, Teen Pregnancys, gangs, and eventually lower Property value resulting in the entire Property being bought by a land developer, and torn down Or run as a slum.
It's happening in America on an Industrial scale. And It's either good or bad Depending On who you ask....
The city I lived near had its two main avenue and street go from being boarded up, Drug/Gang/Crime Infested shitholes to high end safe Economically stable Areas in just 15 short years.
-When you Burn things Down
-New things grow.
Its a sad thing to see. Alot of those people that life in these community seem Like Solid, Honest, People.
The problem is government representatives are the landowners who are in turn bleeding the system and the public dry to line thier pockets why wouldn't they because they have a vested interest in the housing crisis.
I think the ideal of social housing is a great one, and one that should be pursued. It kind of is pursued still is to a degree (see the Bedzed complex in Beddington) but its not being pushed forward enough because of greedy developers and polticians, but also because I think people look back on the government social housing movements in 20th century as massive errors. But it wasn't all failure, as this programme shows. Limit tenant buying and build more council houses!
Poverty is a big problem and needs to be countered.
I am pretty sure that people who want a council house are vetted to see if they are suitable for it, they get it through the housing waiting list. Unions are much weaker today then they used to be and things are getting worse because of it.
Great doco. Can you buy the sound track?! Lol. Some great tunes!
I googed working class act and I don't see anything about people with no desire to work getting priority.
The heygate was also one of the last ever stands of modern styled social housing in the uk
If I could give you more than a thumbs up, I would.
Them high rises flats look scary. Vertigo
pink Candy .. quite true .. I could never live in a high rise block say on the 20th floor. I definitely would constantly feel really uneasy, I get vertigo. My youngest daughter lived in a high rise over South London, though she was only on the 7th floor. One day when I visited her she took me up to the top floor as I wanted to see what the view looked like. After a brief look I had to step back, the street, buildings down below was like looking at a model village, it also made me feel really weird and queasy ....
Robin Hood Gardens, How ironic. Rob from the rich and give to the poor.
1:14 correction if the estate was built in ‘74 and this was filmed in ‘11 it is 37 not 27 years old
The estate looks good architecturely and it was better long ago
God I could'nt live in a tower block I wouldn't be able to go too near the windows and look out it made me queasy just watching them on this. I like the look of that semi circle block of fats.
I used to live in a ten story one, top floor. I remember one time I peeked out from the window; I could see the cable running across the wall straight to the pavement. XD Scariest millisecond in my life.
But still it was some of the fondest time in my memory :)
0:41
Whoa loads of sky dishes
" Whoa loads of sky dishes"
I thought the same thing. Why weren't the dish people forced to put in common dishes and cable from them to the apartments?
If the council asks do u want to sell back ,your rtb. Ex council home then ,something's afoot.
Is there any way to find the subtitles of this documentary ? thanks
Anaïs Petitjean if you're watching on a phone/ tablet you can click the 3 dots on the top right hand corner of the video and click captions then click English.
So so sad.
"So, in eighteen eighty-free"..4:41
I have heard Bob Crow talk a lot more sense than any conservative, I have recently got a council property I was made homeless by my uncle I was placed in band 3.
The tories are letting in all these immigrants and not enough money is being spent on benefits,council housing,infrastructure,defense and important things like that.
interesting how it all began.
no wonder family's had so many kids back then, they had not tv
This announcer is nuts in the closed communities of the super rich you have to keep your place up to standard. If the super rich have to live up to a standard what the middle class cant keep the place looking decent. Crazy man!
It's not so bad now but I am one of the poorest people in the country and I am concerned about my future. I don't have a future to look forward to.
Is this U.K's version of U.S.A.'s section 8?
+soldier person Sorta I think. In the US federal housing is based on income. Currently they want medium income families to move in them because to many pay so little rent the federal government cant afford to keep them fixed up. I am one of those medium income persons. I pay the maximum flat rate and frankly I am moving. These people are nasty fuckers. You constantly battle roaches and bedbugs. There is no advantage to living in these unless there is a housing shortage.
Reuben Stern Big Pharma only exist in one country and that is America. All other counties have socialized medicine and have very specific laws to protect it. Drug reps are illegal and advertisement for prescription medications is illegal in print and television ads. Now the cosmetic and natural medicine camps do exactly the same thing the pharmaceutical industries do. The majority of medication used every day have never been tested they were grandfathered in during the formation of the FDA. They rely only on clinical observation as to effect.
1, we have all the big pharma companies here, GSK, Pfizer and even Monsanto, they are international, so big they influence governments all over the world. That' how they got the name big pharma... 2. why did you just come out with that?
Reuben Stern Because its the truth. In socialized medicine the government takes bids from pharm companies. This is why medication is under a third of the cost than it is in America . Come to America and shit your pants at the price of our medications.
+keith “yoro 70” parkhill My sister was prescribed a medicine that cost almost $200 per pill, she couldn't afford it. If there isn't any generic form of a drug available, a pharmaceutical company can jack up the price as high as they want to. Their excuse is that America has to burden the costs of the research and development for the medicines, I guess because we have no other choice, or we're the only ones dumb enough to pay those prices without rioting in the streets for a change - and we have no say-so in a runaway government entirety controlled by corporations and international bankers. America is fucked - and fucked up!
Is housing of the working classes act 1885 the act you are referring to? I have not heard of it before and I know a lot about things like this. I don't think there is any evidence of unemployed having priority over people with jobs. Things have been going down hill ever since Thatcher attacked the unions.
Um, the Cabrini project in Chicago (which preceded Britain's "experiement) was exactly this type of massive high-rise equivalent of your "Council" buildings. It was a disaster. Come to think of it, the Ozzies did the same thing in Sydney and "council" buildings were going up in Brussels the last time I was there. All that results from this type of "beneficial" project is a high-rise, crime-ridden slum with a remarkable murder rate (usually by tossing people off the top floors). Still, would any of these other countries ask if it works? What, ask Americans...
Are these housing, the same as , Government housing in the U.S ?
Yelirhs Sewns no, the conditions are worse in America. Not good either place but there’s more of a system in UK that serves better the people. Hard to believe but very true.
@@sillyocean3279 LMFAO sure about that 🤔
Yeah ... Council/Estate Housing in England is the same as Public/Project Housing in the USA
@@jlh8830 Are YOU sure about that? Did you ever visit the "projects" in Chicago before they tore them down? They made these homes look like Buckingham Palace. The TV show in the '70's called "Good Times" attempted to show how run down and dangerous these neighborhoods in Chicago had become... in less than 20 years! Today they are gone and the poor have been displaced all over Chicago's southside.
Dutchman Kamstra Public housing in America varies from one place to the next the same as it does in The UK. Some people are placed in beautiful homes in suburban neighborhoods others are placed in more “urban” neighborhoods. However in America unlike the UK if you are a married couple you will not get benefits nor will you get public housing despite having children. If you are a single adult in America and you do not have a disability that prevents you from working or children you will not get public assistance or housing. Lastly despite what you hear in the media you must be an American citizen to receive benefits or housing.
interesting vid - this is what is needed in spain homes made 4 the ppl
I'm not in any debt at all.
where did it go wrong?well for a start maggie sold them all off...and now there not buiding anymore we have no houses,if they had spent the money on doing them up,half the country would have somewhere too live,even the high rises could have been used for single people ot mabe the homeless who im sure would love somewhere to live...makes me sick,on estates 5 out of 30 are council now, the rest are privatly owned...
We aren't building enough houses thanks to the green belt. What's wrong with letting people buy their council house?
Plus, it's better to pay rent to some middle class cunt then the government, who will just spend it on questionable wars and give it to their rich friends in the form of overpriced contracts and subsidies...
council housing was built in the first place so that people who could not afford to own their own home would have somewhere decent to live...and if those places still existed there would still be a flux of housing still available..as it was people brought them cheap and sold for a substantial profit..maggie thatcher was the ruin of this country with her grand ideas...and now the people are still suffering for from her lack of clarity.Yes there is a green belt ..i agree ,but the rent from those houses that were still inhabited by council tenants would have gone to buy up other propertys to use for social housing...in every steet in the citys there are houses in dilapidatied states that will fall down before they can repair them,
The council houses ended up being dilapidated. When you don't own something, you have much less incentive to look after it. It was easier to reward the people who did look after them with houses, than to fix them up,p, and for them to become dilapidated once again...
Liam Abrahams no my friend the failure was the management of the housing organisations they were privatised and dint care who lived in a house as long as they got money ... from managing people and teaching the m as they move up the chain we bunched all the shite in with the good
23:08 That sounds like the actor Leslie Howard narrating but it appears to be the man in the pinstriped suit @ 24:39 (all posh English people sounded the same then) - does anyone know where that archive film is from?
43:20 is that Heaven 17?
It is The Human League - Empire State Human
I've never understood council housing. I'm still not sure if it is the same as US public housing or more like private housing under a residence agency or community contract. US public housing was always for poor people, and always badly done and badly maintained. After WWII, many tracts of small single homes and duplexes were built for the soldiers and their new families. These were always sold, with no overseeing council. Interesting.
You're probably thinking of Levittown. Levitt built all over, New Jersey (now called Willingboro), Long Island, Puerto Rico and Pennsylvania for instance. They were cheap and filled a need for the 12 million veterans coming home and getting on with their long delayed life stages, a wife, a home, a decent job and children.
As for the public housing I don't think there was a time when they weren't filled with people on welfare recipients and people who were too familiar with the precinct and the court system. They were all built in the most crime ridden neighborhoods which incredibly became even more crime ridden.The first one I remember was built on the grounds of Ebbets Field where the Brooklyn Dodgers had played before they left for Los Angeles. It was a no go from the start.
I worked in lots of them as a telephone installer with New York Telephone in the South Bronx. You didn't dare stay there after dark but the days weren't much better.
Here in Charlotte I had a service call at night in one of the worst ones. I was working in a terminal when a salt and pepper cop team came by in their cruiser and wanted to know why I was there at night and by myself. "Even we don't come here alone and at night" said one. By the 1990s I refused to work in them any more. Too many crack dealers with guns. Worse was the crack addicts needing money for crack.
I worked in Miami in a place called Liberty City. I quit after I became a witness to a murder and had to testify. A guy had pulled up with a shotgun and shot his girl friend and her boyfriend in her car right through the windshield.
These council houses were built way better and the original tenants were good hard working people. Filling them with people on subsidies killed the places.
I'm not sure how or where you got this information about US public housing. Have you lived in the US? Yes, some housing is far less than ideal, but there are many types of housing earmarked for many different people in different situations. Not all these people are poor; however, many are. There's Section 8 Housing, which is often highly monitored and the properties, houses and apartments, are inspected and have to pass inspection in order for the landlord to receive the portion of the rent from the government. It is subsidized housing, but Section 8 is not the only subsidized housing provider. There is housing especially for people who have mental illness, addiction issues, developmental disabilities, physical disabilities. Yes, like all countries, the US has its housing problems, but generally the housing there is far better than housing in the UK. I know; I lived in the US for over 39 years. I have now been in England 10 years too long and have been living in its unfair and substandard housing!!!
What's to understand?! What happened in the UK was that the poor ended up living in slum conditions. Slums meant, for example, no running water inside houses, large families occupying 2 room premises, and a toilet shared by up to an entire street. Presumably those properties were owned by landlords and rented at minimal rates. It was a situation not tolerable in the (at the time) world's richest nation. So, the slums were compulsorily purchased by the state and demolished. In their place, modern and more comfortable housing was constructed (and owned) by the local government, and leased to those in need for affordable rents: council houses. Much later (in the 1980s) most of this housing stock was sold off, reflecting a higher general standard of living, though some still remains in the hands of quangos.
Robert Cuminale I’ve lived in New York much of my life, while I agree with much of what you said I would also like to mention there are suburban areas in Queens and Long Island that are majority section 8 homes and they are in very nice neighborhoods. My parents purchased one such home in the 1970s. Now I will mention that unlike the UK the homes in the US that are in suburban areas are more than likely privately owned and they simply accept section 8 funding. But some are also owned by the city of New York
What dd he do with his Ts and Rs ???
sandle wearers = good people
Compliment Thief ,👎🏿your point?
Your compliment is?
pfft .. creepy presenter's clothing and apparel evidently more drab-looking than most of the housing he's covering while peddling social engineering (e.g., many of his introductory assumptions he utters to his guests and hosts) .. tut tut
What are "dole scum"? People on the dole need to be supported. The torys attacking the welfare state need's to be opposed.
Now i know why they all went to shit...
WHAT BEAUTIFUL HOUSING YOU CAN HAVE WHEN SOMEONE ELSE PAYS FOR IT. GOD BLESS SOCIALIST
Its not that someone else pays its that everyone pays everyone contributes to the pot and it is spilt equally between the people, providing universal housing education, health care etc. etc. providing the best to everyone regardless of class or wealth and paid for by everyone. It benefits everyone god bless socialism.
+ejcmoorhouse it is not split equally. Some pay a shit load of taxes and some pay nothing. Pump your infantile marxist bullshit on someone else.
+utubevidyo it is subsidized housing PERIOD, if it wasn't it would be called PRIVATE. It is not.
BTW even at 50 pounds per month, you get 12,000 pounds of subsidies over a 20 years period paid by fellow citizens. Just keep lying to yourself
garybsg Well that is true, but not everyone is capable of paying taxes. From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs. If you have the ability to pay you should for you are helping people less well off than yourself, but you should know that at any time you find yourself in need then the collective taxes of the many will help you too. Now go and pump your selfish bullshit on someone else.
+ejcmoorhouse Yes my Marxist comrade I see your point. However, people who are less well off are suppose to change their life to be better off not turn into parasites.
Socialist rules:
#1. I need something, I take it from someone else because I need it.
#2 After stealing someone else's money then mumble some collective bullshit like "compassionate society or social good"
#3 Get angry at people who point out you are parasitic scumbag
You mean 37
Gardens at each home? Why--that's just like taking food from the mouths of the children of professional farmers! What an outrage! Where are the agricultural lobbyists?
48:01+ = :-D
Dirty haha jk :)
Social housing was a great idea because of Socialist influence. During the 20th Century everyone in Europe was guaranteed a roof over their heads till some short sighted politicians and greedy fat cats dissolved it. People nowadays are more likely to struggle and some one is making money out of it no wonder we have massive social problems and breakdowns in UK and EU bring back social living standards.