Margaret Thatcher and her advisors understood that the conditions on most large council estates by the 1980s were a perfect opening for an attack on another aspect of the gains working people had won after the war - and so introduced the "right to buy" your council house. Of course in practice it was rarely on sink estates that this "right" was exercised - instead more desirable properties on smaller estates and streets were quickly snapped up. Properties were then often sold on to developers who made huge profits from this asset stripping.
The "right to buy" was also combined with restrictions on local authorities preventing them spending adequate sums of money repairing existing council properties or building new ones.
In this area as in many others new Labour has followed in its predecessor’s footsteps. Not only did they fail to repeal the Tory measures but set about implementing further proposals of their own which would in effect end the provision of social housing.
In the last year new Labour sold off 140,000 homes - more than the Tories achieved in their last 10 years in office.
Today around £20 billion is required to clear the backlog of repair work on existing council homes. In its desperation to pursue privatisation the government is now bribing councils with a budget of £12 billion to write off capital debts if they agree to transfer homes.
The attempt to carry out large scale transfers of council estates - in some cases consisting of the entire public housing stock of a particular area - has been met by determined resistance by a coalition of tenants and trade unionists. Those who remember the days of Rackman landlords have been particular prominent in these battles led by the Campaign to Defend Council Housing. These campaigns have been successful in a number of areas, winning some ballots against transfer, while in other places councils have withdrawn plans for privatisation in the face of strong local opposition.
Pushed back by the success of these campaigns, the government has been forced to change tack. Now it is now pushing forward an equally dangerous proposal in the shape of "arm’s- length" housing companies.
Under this scheme the estates would continue to be owned by local authorities but managed by housing associations. Rents would inevitably rise but because councils would nominally continue to own the houses, tenants would not even get a vote on this type of sell-off.
We say that the sell off of council properties must end and there should be a massive injection of money into council estates to allow repairs to take place. There should also be an end to all restrictions on councils spending money on either repairs or building new homes.
The other aspect of government policy in this area which they have trumpeted with great fanfare is dealing with street homelessness. The reasons people end up living on the streets are not just to do with housing shortages. When many large mental hospitals were closed with completely inadequate replacement provision in the community, many who had been locked up for decades ended up on the streets. Today when asylum seekers are denied benefit, many of them end up sleeping rough. But of course the lack of affordable housing only makes the situation worse.
The government’s response is to come up with gimmicks like the appointment of a "homelessness Czar", who seems to have little grasp on the reality of homeless people’s lives. The drive to get homeless people off the streets at all cost without sufficient money being put into proper resettlement packages may massage the statistics - but it won’t solve the real problems.
Instead some people will go from one short term hostel to another, and some will end up being part of the increasing numbers of people in overcrowded accommodation. Overcrowding is also growing because of the attacks on young people through the withdrawal of housing benefit and grants and the imposition of fees on students - who are therefore forced to live at home.
We say what is needed is a massive programme of building public housing and proper resources given to resettlement programmes. We want the restoration of housing benefit rights to everyone and end to capping. There should be a proper regulation of the private sector - strengthen the Fair Rent Act and impose decent health and safety standards on private landlords.