How England became one of the hardest places to find a decent home

Good morning. Some breaking news from Scotland: Labour has has won the Rutherglen and Hamilton West byelection with an overwhelming victory over the SNP. Labour has declared the win “seismic”, with the party securing a majority of 9,446 and a resounding swing of over 20%. If the result were replicated at a general election Labour might win another 40 Scottish seats potentially clearing a route to power.

Now to today’s topic, which might not come as too much of a surprise to many of you: England has been named “the most difficult place to find a home in the developed world”.

This is according to a report by the UK’s housebuilding industry trade body, which obviously has significant skin in the game as it wants the government to ease up restrictions to allow more building. But speak to anyone trying to buy – or particularly rent – a home, and there’s no escaping the fact that we are in the midst of a housing crisis.

It’s certainly no surprise to Damien Irving, 45, who works as media services engineer for Arsenal. He was paying £1,350-a-month for a “frankly gross” one-bedroom flat in Wood Green – closer to rival Tottenham Hotspur’s stadium than the Emirates – until his landlord jacked up the rent.

“I have a well-paid job,” Damien says. “Yet I struggled for the entire year to pay the rent for what was a pretty awful flat, and then the landlord wanted more money.” So he moved out. But finding a new place “was near impossible – I was looking at moving into a random house share at 45 years old”.

More on the housing crisis from Damien, and the Guardian’s social affairs correspondent Rob Booth, after the headlines.

Five big stories

In depth: ‘Everyone knows there’s a problem – but no one has done anything about it’

“When I tried to view places, the agents would say it was only possible to look round if you went on an open day with dozens of other people looking round as well,” Damien says. “It’s a war out there – people are so desperate they will offer to move in immediately, pay two months deposit, offer over the already huge advertised rent.”

Damien’s experience* is backed up by stats from property website Rightmove which show each rental property across the UK has an average queue of 25 tenants trying to view it. That’s up from an average of 20 just five months ago, and from eight in 2019.

Average rental prices outside London have hit a record £1,278 a month – the record has been broken every one of the last 15 consecutive quarters. And rents are now 10% higher than this time last year. In London, the average rent is £2,627-a-month – also a record, and 12.1% higher than last year.

How bad is the housing crisis?

Rob, who has covered housing as a journalist for 25 years, says there’s been a crisis for as long as he can remember. “It’s boiling frog syndrome – everyone has known there’s a problem,” says Rob. “But no one has done anything about it and now it’s a real crisis.

“Successive governments haven’t built anywhere near enough homes for decades, there’s not enough supply and that’s sent up prices both for buyers and renters.”

The Home Builders Federation (HBF) report found that England has the lowest proportion of vacant homes per capita in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), a group of 38 nations, including most of the EU, the US, Japan and Australia.

The homes that the UK does have are in the worst condition of all European countries. In Poland, just 6% of homes were found to be blighted with leaks, damp or rot, according to figures from Eurostat. In the UK it is 18%.

The figure that really jumps out is the cost of renting in the UK. “Almost a quarter of private renters in the UK are ‘overburdened’ by housing costs, according to OECD data,” says Rob. “That means they are spending more than 40% of their income on rent. In France it’s 9%, and in Germany it’s just 5%.

“That’s a huge amount of people who are spending too much on housing, it’s inhibiting their lives, and their ability to make progress.”

How did it get this bad?

Rob says it goes back to Margaret Thatcher’s right to buy policy in the 1980s, which allowed tenants to buy council houses from local authorities. “A huge number of homes were sold off, and they weren’t replaced,” Rob says. “The balance between social and private housing was fundamentally shifted.” (For more on right to buy’s legacy, you can read this First Edition from last June.)

The problem has since been compounded, Rob says, by successive governments – both Conservative and Labour – failing to hit their housebuilding targets.

Many of the homes that have been built are of such poor design and quality that they have, Rob says, “turned large numbers of voters into nimbys who are very wary of any new home projects near them”.

“That pushes up land prices, as there’s very few places where new homes can be built without getting too many people’s backs up.”

What could be done?

“It’s very unlikely to get better soon,” Rob says. “The problem is that housing has become an investment vehicle for people, and it is increasingly important for politicians to maintain the value of those investments. They’re too scared to do anything radical that might make housing more affordable.”

Thinking radically, Rob says, is the only way to solve the problem. “We need to start a new wave of council house building. We need a new generation of new towns like in the postwar period.”

He says they should be “anchored” with good quality council housing built to last a 150 years with private housing built around them making a genuinely desirable places to live. “You look at Letchworth garden city or Milton Keynes, they are hugely desirable places to live.”

But wouldn’t nimbys campaign against the next new town revolution. “Probably, but perhaps there needs to be a recognition of the social need after the upheavals we have had in recent years,” Rob says. “Maybe we need a moment of shock to force politicians to act.”

*In case you’re worrying about Damien’s living situation, he eventually got a “bargain mates rates deal” on a one-bed in north London.

What else we’ve been reading

This week’s reader interview with Joan Baez is a corker. She talks candidly about confidence over the years, the hippy generation, God and politics. Nimo

Hamza was sitting alone in a van, handcuffed and crying. He was one of dozens of men selected for removal from the UK to Rwanda in the UK’s ill-fated deportation scheme. Daniel Trilling’s long read on the policy is a must read. Rupert

Tech journalist Taylor Lorenz spoke to Monica Lewinsky about misogyny in the media, harassment and their hope for how things can get better. Nimo

In the third Paddington film, out next year, the bear returns home to his “darkest Peru”. Only the movie is actually filmed in Colombia because the producers were daunted by the bureaucratic barriers of filming in Peru. Now Dan Collyns reports that plans to ease the bureaucratic burden has sparked a row about the threat to Indigenous film-making. Rupert

Susan Sarandon has had a storied career and is enjoying a new wave of fans on social media. As her 77th birthday approaches, the Guardian has ranked her 20 best performances. Nimo

Sport

Football | Liverpool returned to their winning ways with a minimum of fuss in their 2-0 Europe League win over Union Saint Gilloise. Brighton recovered from the shock of conceding two goals in less than 90 seconds to Marseille and fought back to end the game 2-2, keeping their hopes of progressing from the group stages alive.

Cricket | New Zealand beat England by nine wickets after an explosive World Cup run: “The final game of the last World Cup provided England’s cricket fans with some of their most treasured memories; the first of this one will have produced some of the most grisly,” writes Simon Burnton.

Football | Jonas Eidevall has signed a new three-year contract as Arsenal’s manager in a show of support from the club after a disappointing start to the women’s team’s season. Arsenal were eliminated by Paris FC in a Champions League qualifier last month and lost their opening Women’s Super League game at home to Liverpool last Sunday.

The front pages

“Out of control”, is the Guardian’s main headline, as it reports “Scientists stunned by planet’s record September heat”. The Telegraph reports “Starmer will not bring HS2 back to life”, while the i follows the same story with “New HS2 plan is in doubt, 24 hours after Sunak speech”.

The Times leads with “CPS calls for clemency over ‘mercy killing’ cases”. The Financial Times reports “Metro offers rivals slice of mortgage book in bid to shore up balance sheet”.

The Mirror has “Our pride of Britain”, looking ahead to the awards and winners. The Sun leads with “Holly’s kidnap plot terror”, saying a reported plan to target the This Morning host has been “smashed”.

Something for the weekend

Our critics’ roundup of the best things to watch, read and listen to right now

TV
Lupin (Netflix)
More than anything, Lupin has become a folk hero. He is able to charm and convince all he encounters into thinking of crime as an insidious social construct that primarily exists to serve the unscrupulous 1%. The idea of Lupin, the idea of Assane Diop and the idea of Arsène Lupin are more than just the consequences for a single man; it’s about confronting the broken system around us and revelling in the fantasy of not playing by its rules. We need an anti-hero to believe in, and Lupin provides that in spades. Leila Latif

Music
Bakar: Halo
As always, Bakar deals melodies that spill sunshine – Alive! is a perky follow-up to last year’s superb The Mission. And his singing is better than ever, whether reminiscent of Billie Eilish’s lean-in intimacies (Facts_Situations) or Kele Okereke’s husky confessionals (I’m Done). Yet mostly Halo feels like an inch rather than a leap forward. He may need more of the ravening attack of his full-band live show. Next time, perhaps. Damien Morris

Film
The Great Escaper
There’s a huge amount to enjoy from these legendary performers: Michael Caine and Glenda Jackson are a great double-act, despite being apart for much of the film, and there is also an interesting and poignant rapport between Bernard and an elderly ex-RAF officer on the ferry, sympathetically played by John Standing, who is heading for Normandy while crucified by a secret guilt. Peter Bradshaw

Podcast
Lasagna Ganja (Widely available, episodes weekly)
Ignore the sound effects of people taking massive tokes and bubbling bongs; it’s the podcast that shows stoners can be entrepreneurs too. Affable hosts Xzibit and Tammy “the Cannabis Cutie” provide a good balance of education and wasted giggles as they speak to industry experts about the benefits of weed and the latest trends. Hannah Verdier

Today in Focus

Cartoon of the day | Ben Jennings

The Upside

A bit of good news to remind you that the world’s not all bad

Ballroom was first established in New York City by the Black and Latin drag community in the early 1980s. The culture has been depicted in film, music and television and four decades later has been transported all over the world. Hundreds walked the Élysée’s floors at Paris’ largest LGBTQ+ ballroom to date, travelling from across the world to compete for 55 trophies and cash prizes.

Inspired by the GMHC Latex Ball in New York, the oldest and largest international Ball founded, the ELB in Paris was established to celebrate the city’s vibrant LGBTQ+ ballroom community. The French capital now has the largest and most active ballroom community in Europe with dozens of houses competing in balls twice a month – it has spawned its own subculture that inspires the haute couture and French glam that it once imitated.

“Every time we step foot on the catwalk, this is our riot, this is our statement,” says Parisian house DJ Kiddy Smile.

Sign up here for a weekly roundup of The Upside, sent to you every Sunday

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