Am I crazy? Surely giving social housing tenants the right to buy their homes and reducing their rent by 1% every year for four years is good news. Don't be fooled! In the short term these measures might seem advantageous to people living in social housing. In fact in the long term they pose a real threat to the very organisations that provide such housing and therefore to the tenants and future tenants. They also pose a threat to every taxpayer. Who will pay to pick up the pieces when housing associations (RPs) go under? Once lost to a social housing landlord, rent money cannot be recovered. Social landlords will not benefit financially from the sell-off of their properties - people's homes - but will have insufficient surpluses with which to replace them with new housing. Many RPs will have to shelve indefinitely their plans to develop new housing. Much social housing is old and costly to maintain. RPs might also have drastically to curtail their plans to modernise these homes. If they're really strapped for cash, routine maintenance plans will also be adversely affected. The knock-on effects of the Government's plans are serious and wide-ranging. There is a housing crisis! This is not the time to be impoverishing the very organisations that could help to remedy that.

Many people are now having to seek private rented accommodation, due to there being a lack of social housing. They are being exploited by rogue, and greedy landlords, who can get away with mistreating tenants because they don`t have anywhere else to go. It`s common to read: NO DSS, NO PETS and NO CHILDREN ! Are people on benefits commiting a crime by having to accept benefits ?? Landlords are able to dictate terms, increase the rent and give you short notice to leave. We need to have affordable and secure tenancies, not expensive private lets. Previous, and existing governments, have created this dilemma, and they have admitted to relying on private landlords to fill in the gap. Right to buy is brilliant for the people that can take advantage of this opportunity, but, if there is no plan to replace these properties, they are lost to anyone wanting to rent for ever. I believe that the revenue from the right to buy was used to help pay off the national debt; which is very short sighted, and has resulted in the dire situation we have in the housing market now. I would like to reiterate, please, can we have some COMMON SENSE used before any government policies are implemented ?

Because it's someone brother, sister, dad, uncle, etc. They are human beings and should not be treated like that