Right time for housing

In less than a year’s time, the UK will have a new government. Whilst it remains unclear what the outcome of the election in May 2015 will be, the run-up to the election provides an opportunity to put housing at the heart of any new government’s agenda.

Everybody needs a home

As we approach the general election, the Right to Rent campaign is part of a broader strategy to lobby for a holistic, cross-tenure approach to housing in the UK for the first time in a generation.

Right to Rent aims to provide thousands of struggling families with a secure and affordable home for life, by transferring the ownership of their property into the social rented sector.

As part of CIH and Inside Housing’s Rising Stars competition, finalists were invited to spend a day at Shelter, to discuss our campaigns and the wider housing agenda in the context of the forthcoming election

Shelter believes that everybody needs a home - not just a property. To realise this means recognising the true social value of housing, beyond the bricks and mortar. A home is a basic need for individuals and families upon which their education, health, employment and relationships depend.

In the same way that governments accept and promote the public good of health and education, arguably the same is required for housing.
This would require a fundamental reversal of the way that successive governments have viewed and approached housing over decades. Not too ambitious then.

How do we plan a successful campaign?

Antonia Bance, head of campaigns at Shelter, highlights the importance of planning a campaign based on insight and the real needs of a clearly defined target audience. To be successful, any campaign needs to engage its target audiences - in our case an electorate who are increasingly concerned and affected by housing issues, and politicians who have the power to make changes once in government.

To deliver a successful campaign, it is vital to reach out beyond those who already agree with the need to address housing issues. To make a change in society you need to be talked to and not just talked about.

Promoting a manifesto for housing

Shelter’s chief executive, Campbell Robb, pressed the need to make the most of every opportunity to lobby for Shelter’s overall strategic objective for government - that it builds 250,000 more houses every year. This is over twice what is being built currently.

Many changes are required to guarantee homes for all, and not just properties for developers and investment opportunities for the wealthy.

In building the Right to Rent campaign, we would be deliberately bringing together stakeholders from different tenures. Housing professionals and campaigners will be able to speak with one clear voice, rather than several competing ones.

Through launching a joint ‘Housing Manifesto’ backed by housing and campaigning organisations, the sector could outline the need and benefits for Right to Rent, alongside other issues including licensing private landlords, capping rents, and abolishing Right to Buy.

Changing how the electorate sees housing

To engage with voters requires the sector to engage beyond itself - with the mass and new media in particular. When is the last time a soap or series drama ran a storyline about mortgage repossession or how families are routinely struggling to pay the rent?

In an age of social media, the potential for the housing sector to impact upon the next general election is limitless. If social media fuelled revolutions in the Middle East, imagine the potential it could have amongst Middle England.

Equally, we need to step up political engagement - holding fringe events at party conferences and launching pledge websites for voters to hold the next generation of MPs to account.

Margaret Thatcher appealed to the fears and aspirations of a generation and changed the zeitgeist of housing following the 1979 general election. Now is the time to change it once again. The Right to Rent campaign is one step towards putting housing at the heart of the next general election.