Simon Hughes faces dilemma as coalition tries to end social housing

If the Liberal Democrats in the coalition have frequently to remind some of their remaining leftwing supporters that they did not win the last election, and therefore cannot decide every coalition policy, this problem is multiplied fivefold for Simon Hughes.

The Lib Dem deputy leader is not superhuman, and can only change so much of what comes out of government – but social housing is a special case for Hughes. He needs a win here if he is to retain his political credibility. His constituency is full of social housing and it is an issue on which he has set out some red lines in the past.

It may not have the political impact of tuition fees, but for a group of MPs and Lib Dem councillors, this matters. So Grant Shapps, the capable Conservative housing minister, is not making life easy for Hughes.

By briefing that he is ending the secure tenancy in social housing, reducing the tenancy to an insecure two years, Shapps has given Hughes a big political headache.

The reality of the policy released yesterday is a little more nuanced, at least since David Cameron first blurted out his plan to end the council house for life.
The new short-term tenancy lasting a minimum of two years will not apply to existing tenancies in social housing. It will also be for councils to decide whether to introduce it. An existing council tenant who agrees to a council's request to downsize should also be allowed to keep a secure tenancy. It also appears from the consultation paper that there is no specific incentive designed to encourage councils to introduce the short-term tenancies. Older people, the disabled and the ill may also be excluded.

As one Hughes ally put it: "There is a good chance that centre-left councils, the ones most likely to have a large amount of council housing, will simply not participate in this scheme."

But there are some pretty tough measures in the consultation paper. They will give latitude for more rightwing councils to introduce two-year tenancies, and to evict a tenant on six months' notice. They will then be expected to go into the private rented sector – where rents are far higher. The goal is pretty specific: make life in a council house more insecure, so increasing labour market flexibility, even if it means breaking up communities.

For instance, it will be possible for councils in future to tell children they will no longer be able to stay in their parents' council home if their parents have died. The council home can only be transferred on death to the spouse or partner.
Shapps is also preparing to end the requirement for councils to run open waiting lists for their properties, a rule that has seen the number of people on waiting lists increase significantly.

Shapps has decided that in future local authorities will largely decide who to allow on to their waiting lists, reversing the open waiting list introduced in 2002. This measure should see a big statistical fall in the numbers on waiting lists without any objective change in need.

A council in future will also be able, if it wishes, to restrict access to the waiting lists purely to the homeless, or the overcrowded. Central government will still oversee the rules on access to social housing for non-EU nationals. Finally councils will be deemed to have fulfilled their duties to the homeless so long as they make an offer of a place in a private rented home.

Hughes was last night emphasising that it will be for councils themselves to decide whether to take up these changes, but he is also stressing that this is a consultation. Hughes has eight weeks to turn some of this around, but judging by the support for the plans coming from the Lib Dem local government minister, Andrew Stunnell, he faces a political Everest.