Friday 21 July 2017

I Wonder Who Decides Which Articles Don't Get Opened For Comment On 'CiF'..?

Last week the latest homeless figures revealed that black and minority ethnic (BME) communities are bearing the brunt of seven years of rising homelessness. The statistics reveal that 36% of people accepted as statutorily homeless by local authorities in England during 2016-17 were from a BME background: close to three times their representation in the population.
Isn't that almost exactly their representation in the justice system too? And I don't mean on the right side of the dock!
What is surprising is how little this disproportionate level of housing need on racial grounds has registered in the wake of the Grenfell Tower fire, where the majority of residents were from a BME background.
Oh, it's registered, chum! Believe me, it's registered...
BME households are more likely than white ones to experience housing stress, such as overcrowding, poorer quality housing and fuel poverty, and to be more concentrated in England’s most deprived neighbourhoods.
So what possible conclusion are you coming to? I wonder, I do indeed wonder...
Institutional racism has played a continuing role in perpetuating racial discrimination and disadvantage in housing.
Ah. Of course. There it is!
Residential qualifications have returned to the social housing system through the Localism Act 2011. And choice-based lettings approaches have reduced BME community access to social housingwhere applicants to social housing can choose to compete for a vacant home (usually online), rather than through housing needs-based approaches to allocating homes are also shown to indirectly disadvantages BME communities. We know that policies like these only sustain the persistence of racial discrimination in England’s housing system. If we want to correct this, we need to start talking about institutional racism in our housing system again.
That 'if' in your last sentence is doing a lot of work.

8 comments:

rbbarnet said...

Migration Watch UK tried to get all London councils to give the BME and foreigners percentage of annual allocations to HAs. Many councils simply refused but the ones who did confirmed what everyone knows: in london 90% of annual allocations goes to those two groups.

The Jannie said...

My heart bleeds . . . . This SJW needs to try life as a retired taxpayer with several debilitating afflictions - retired but still paying tax!-trying to obtain social housing.

Flaxen Saxon said...

Let them eat rice.....

Jonathan said...

English people are treated differently to foreigners? Good.

rbbarnet said...

'Good' in what way?

Anonymous said...

Jonathan is obviously Scottish

Jonathan said...

'Good' in what way?

In that English people are given houses, foreigners are not.

JuliaM said...

"Many councils simply refused but the ones who did confirmed what everyone knows: in london 90% of annual allocations goes to those two groups."

*speechless*

"This SJW needs to try life as a retired taxpayer with several debilitating afflictions..."

I think being a SJW is pretty debilitating...

"Let them eat rice....."

:D

"In that English people are given houses, foreigners are not."

If only that was true....