Pensioner groups have been outraged by Housing Minister, Grant Shapps’ proposal to get older people to downsize their properties to make way for younger families.
He proposes that local authorities take over the responsibility for maintaining and renting out the properties to younger families, passing on any profit made from the affordable rents back to the elderly owners.
The National Pensioners’ Convention demanded to know why older people were being targeted to solve the housing crisis, when the responsibility for increasing housing lay with the Government.
Neil Duncan-Jordan, of the National Pensioners’ Convention, said: “The shortage of affordable housing for younger families is not the fault of Britain’s pensioner population.”
He went on to say that although many elderly people were keen to downsize, there was a big shortage of suitable accommodation for them to move into. ”If you’re in a three-bedroom house and you actually want to downsize, the market isn’t exactly brimming with retirement accommodation.”
Mr Shapps said that currently there were about 25 million bedrooms unoccupied in England due to older couples staying in their homes long after their children have left home. He said that this was one way to solve the national housing shortage, claiming that the idea would help many elderly people who wanted to downsize but found it difficult to do so.
He talked of a scheme in Redbridge, East London which has encouraged pensioners to downsize, and suggested that it could become a nationwide scheme.
He said: ‘For too long the housing needs of the elderly have been neglected.
“Older people who should be enjoying their homes have watched helplessly as their properties have become prisons, and many have been forced to sell their homes and move into residential care.”
“Urgent change is needed to ensure the nation’s housing needs are met. Moving to more suitable accommodation can make a life-changing difference for some older people.”
Saga, the over-50s group blasted the proposal as “outrageous social engineering”, Ros Altman said “It is an insult to older people to suggest councils should take over their houses while they get shoved into housing,’ she said.
‘A family home is about more than bricks and mortar: our surveys show people don’t want to downsize. Older people will be horrified that the home they have put so much love and care into could be deemed by an official to be not suitable for them, but let out to younger families they don’t even know.’
She added: ‘Pensioners should not feel pressured into making way for younger families. Older people are right to feel aggrieved at being made to feel guilty when throughout their lives they have cut back on spending to build up their own home.’
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