Minister's housing plans criticised
A minister has been accused of risking a "return to the workhouse" after saying the unemployed should have to seek work or lose their council homes.
Housing minister Caroline Flint said there was clear evidence that there are many long-term unemployed in social housing who may be able to find employment with the right support.
And she suggested that new council tenants who can work could have to sign "commitment contracts", agreeing to actively seek employment.
Housing charities criticised the idea. Shelter chief executive Adam Sampson said: "The Government wants to return Britain's unemployed to the workhouse by throwing them onto the streets. What is being proposed would destroy families and communities and add to the thousands who are already homeless."
Alan Walter, chairman of the Defend Council Housing pressure group, said: "This is obviously part of a long-running strategy to try and stigmatise council housing as housing of last resort. It runs alongside continuing blackmail on tenants and councils to privatise council homes, asset stripping public land for private development and forcing people into the private market."
Leslie Morphy, chief executive at Crisis, the national charity for single homeless people, said: "Social housing now contains some of the most vulnerable people in society. Our experience at Crisis shows that encouragement and enablement - and not threats - are the way to help homeless and vulnerable people to build independent lives."
In her speech to the Fabian Society in London, Ms Flint said: "Council and social housing must continue to support the most vulnerable in society, but it should also be a springboard to opportunity, not just a safety net."
Ms Flint called for a national debate on breaking the link between social housing and unemployment following a dramatic fall in the number of council tenants in work over the past 25 years. She also set out proposals to build more affordable homes for first-time buyers and families and for council tenants to be given the right to claim compensation when services fall short.
The jobseeking contracts could be extended to existing tenants in a move which would affect up to a million people.
As well as actively searching for work, the documents would require signatories to undertake skills checks to ensure that they are equipping themselves for potential jobs.
