Introduction
Housing in Britain is divided into public and private sectors. Of the 25 million domestic dwellings, the majority are in the private sector, with 68 per cent being owner-occupied and 11 per cent rented out by private landlords. Some 21 per cent are in the public, subsidized sector and are rented by low-income tenants from local government authorities or housing associations. In both public and private sectors, over 80 per cent of the British population lives in houses or bungalows and the remainder in flats and maisonettes. Houses have traditionally been divided into detached, semi-detached and terraced housing, with the greater prices and prestige being given to detached property. Public-sector or social housing in England is controlled centrally by the Department of the Environment and by devolved bodies in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. Much of this housing has historically been provided by local authorities with finance from local sources and central government. But the provision and organization of such properties by local government has declined in recent years and more has been taken over by housing associations (Balchin 1996).
Since 1945 state involvement in housing provision has been enormous. Housing has been one of three areas of general personal consumption, along with health and education, to which governments were committed by the post-war political consensus. There have obviously been variations in policy over the past forty years but housing has consistently been a key concern of successive governments. Housing provision can also be said to demonstrate the philosophy of the mixed economy cherished by most post-war governments. For, unlike education and health which principally have been provided on the basis of need without direct payment, households still pay for their housing directly via rental, mortgage, maintenance and repairs payments which the state subsidizes in various ways. Ideally this is said to enable subsidies to be selectively directed towards those in need, and to enable households to choose the tenure in which they want to live at reasonable cost. The reality, however, has been somewhat different (Ball 1983).
Early in the 20th century the British government realized that most working people were unlikely to save enough money to purchase new housing. The government therefore started building public housing, also called council housing, and the state subsidized the rents of poorer citizens living in this housing. One of the major programs of the Conservative government in the 1980s under Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher was to give up state ownership and control of public housing. Tenants could then buy their houses, and public housing developments could have private landlords. In 1993 the government launched a rent-to-mortgage scheme whereby 1 million tenants could gradually buy their homes. By 1997, 67 percent of the residences in Britain were owned by the people who lived in them, compared to 50 percent in 1971 (Zarembka 1990).
Local authorities are required to provide permanent accommodations for those who unintentionally become homeless. Pregnant women, people with .
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