A surge in applications for the 'right to buy' policy, introduced by Margaret Thatcher in 1980, is overwhelming local authorities in England. The policy, which allows council tenants to buy their homes at discounted prices, is facing a renewed push as the deadline for a reduced discount approaches. This trend highlights the long-term consequences of Thatcherism, with public funds used to build homes being lost through cheap sales, and public money flowing into housing benefits for private landlords. Meanwhile, local authorities struggle with the deluge of applications and the loss of rental income.
Her right to buy policy enriched the private sector at taxpayers’ expense. Last year, it sparked another gold rush – and looming calamity for local authoritieserhaps only England could make its politician of the moment a woman who died more than a decade ago. Yet turn on Channel 4 and watch Margaret Thatcher: the drama. Radio 4 offers Margaret Thatcher: the play, while soon you can enjoy Thatcher: the opera.
You may think you know what’s coming next. Perhaps you figure that, as the deadline loomed, there was a stream of interest. Wrong: there was no stream; there was a deluge.Brent saw a more than 7,000% rise in right-to-buy applications in November over the month before; in Lambeth and Camden, it was more than 2,000%, for Southwark, 1,500%.
With months still left of this financial year, London authorities have together already received 3.5 times the RTB applications they got last year. Call it Thatcher’s hangover: the good times, if that’s what they were, wore off long ago and now all that’s left is a dusty thudding in the head and costs that never stop rising. Her most famous policy, right to buy, shows how the hangover never stops. Public money was spent on building those homes; public money was lost through giving them away cheap; and public money is now funnelled in housing benefit to the landlords who let them out.
Thatcherism Right To Buy Housing Crisis Local Government Privatization Public Spending
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