[Ben Reeve Lewis is disillusioned …)
I have become very disillusioned with news reporting in the wake of Brexit and the Corbyn affair.
Not just the astonishing bias (Laura Kuenssberg leave the room now! And Robert Peston…..please wash your hair) but what they actually choose to report.
The things they choose to report
Last week there were bombs going off all over the world, various crises and yet for some bizarre reason the top story on BBC News was a warning that people should take Vitamin D supplements in the winter.
Marches by Moslems against Islamic State, the refusal of the local Mosque in Rouen to bury the bloke who cut the priest’s throat and the thousands attending rallies across the UK in support of Corbyn, real news getting nary a mention if any at all.
Which is why on Tuesday I was astonished to read the Daily Mirror report that gulp……….there is a housing crisis.
Well fan my fevered brow. You just figured that out?
A National Emergency
The article says that the housing crisis is now a national emergency, like a Hurricane or the collapse of the levees but what makes it a ‘National Crisis’ was just that some nit wit Lib Dem MP said so in a speech.
And what really irked me is that what prompted this article and the stuff on BBC breakfast News was the report from the Resolution Foundation that home ownership has dropped to a 30 year low.
We’ve had years of rising homelessness, evictions, off the scale rents, forced sale of social housing but it only becomes a crisis when home ownership is involved????????????.
How British is that?
Better news in blogs?
The thing is, when you lose your faith in standard printed and broadcast media where do you go to find out what is really going on? Its easier to get spoon fed over your cornflakes or your TV dinner but requires more commitment to go out searching for it.
As I trawl the housing places to write this newsround I am convinced that you can find more accurate and untainted reporting on blogs than you can on TV or broadsheets.
A heinous crime
For instance the excellent Rat & Mouse blog, without whom this week I wouldn’t have known about the fact that 20% of housemates admit to stealing other people’s food from the fridge.
Ok this may not rank with a car bomb in Baghdad but it’s a bloody sight more interesting.
I remember losing my last Kit Kat to a flat mate. One I was dreaming of tucking into when I got home late. As revenge I took a photo of her into work that I knew she hated. Blew it up on the photocopier and wrote on it “This woman stole my Kit Kat”. I then printed off about 30 and late that night I stuck one on virtually every lamppost between our house and her Uni that I knew she would have to walk past to go in the next day.
Vindictive? Probably but damn funny.
20 years later she is still one of my closest friends. I just hide my Kit Kats when she comes around.
Protecting private tenants
24 Dash is another reliable housing news blog who this week informed us that Hackney Council delivered a petition to government ministers urging them to protect private renters.
The petition calls for longer fixed term tenancies, (good luck with that one) and curiously a national rogue landlord database and transparency in letting agents fees, the former of which is already in the pipeline through the Housing Act 2016 and the latter already a requirement since last year.
The petition comes in the form of a 10 point plan, much of which is quite sensible and achievable but it remains to be seen whether or not new housing minister Gavin Barwell will take on board the issues being raised. He will have to take time off from stuffing his pouches with Sunflower seeds…..I mean…..have you ever seen anyone look more like a Hamster?
The article tells us that in Hackney a tenant needs to be earning £51,000 a year to be able to afford to rent a 1 bed flat.
This doesn’t surprise me in the least. I lived in Hackney for a year back in 2009 and its achingly hip, even the street drinkers quaff Prosecco and sit around outside the public toilets at the top of Mare St discussing mythical symbolism in Star Wars films.
Higher Court Fees AGAIN
The ever reliable Pain Smith blog dropped the bombshell on Tuesday that court fees are going up YET AGAIN!!
This time the application for a bailiff’s warrant from £110 to £121 and the High Court transfer up fee now being £66, presumably to pay for the extra time to have an actual, real-life judge rubber stamp the warrant instead of the listings clerk.
£66 might not be an extortionate rise, I believe it was £60 before and a far cry from the £600+ that a High Court Enforcement Company will charge you.
A green tax for landlords?
The Telegraph reported this week on plans I hadn’t read anywhere else, for the implementation of a £5,000 green tax for buy to let landlords wanting to take advantage of the Green Deal for energy efficient home improvements. Formerly a loan, the intention is to get buy to let landlords to pay upfront. The article quotes Richard Jones from the RLA saying:
“Landlords have been harshly treated. This is an extra stealth tax on top of all the other measures that threaten the finances of the sector.”
Whilst simultaneously stating:
“Unless they make funding available, landlords will be forced to pass these costs on to tenants in the form of higher rents”
So isn’t it the tenants who are being harshly treated? And why is it that every time government announces a new rule or requirement for landlords the stock response is to announce that they will immediately pass the costs on to the tenant. Heaven forfend simply taking the hit themselves.
Its like saying “Everytime you annoy me I’m going to punch the person sitting next to me in the face”.
What made me smile this week.
We went to see the new Jason Bourne film ha-ha-ha
What a load of old toot but strangely fun if you don’t think too hard about it.
Much has been written about Matt Damon only having 29 lines in the entire film, in order to satisfy the burgeoning film market of China who don’t like subtitles apparently.
The Las Vegas car case is frankly ludicrous, making the Dukes of Hazard look like a documentary but Vincent Cassell’s villain was worth the entry price. You cant have an American film without a European villain can you? Its in the rules.
See ya next week