Shacked up in a slumdog

future?

The following article is from the day job on Northern, Midlands and Southern Housing magazine. The cover story for the July/August 2011 edition, it speculated the awful outcome of the crisis in housing affordability...

House prices are falling but the barriers to home ownership are as strong as ever. Private rents are rising to record levels, while incomes are stagnant, and there’s just no room at the social housing inn. It all begs the urgent question – just where are we going to live? Mark Cantrell reports

Consider the future: at some critical juncture in the past it all went horribly wrong – and now the slums have arisen. The ramshackle aggregations of corrugated iron and scrap timber structures encrust the outer reaches of our towns and cities. The less fortunate huddle in their cardboard cities festooned in abandoned subways and foetid alleys.

Occasionally, the powers-that-be take steps to clear the sprawling eyesores that blight the more important cities; it’s electorally beneficial to be seen to be tough on squatters, but the operations are fraught with difficulties. These British Slumdogs often resist the clearance of their homes. The bulldozer crews need costly police escorts, riots often ensue, and even successful clearances are fruitless in the final analysis. All they do is shift the problem around. It’s an ugly and divided future – it’s the endgame in the failure to resolve today’s housing crisis...

Read the rest of the article HERE.

Housing magazine, July/August 2011