How stigma shapes social housing policy in England

The reality of life for far too many people and families in England is that they are judged negatively and even actively discriminated against because they rent their home from a social landlord. “Sink estates”, “underclass”, “work-shy”, “uneducated”, “lacking in aspiration”, “zones of criminality”, “benefit scroungers”, “drug-infested”, “getting something for nothing ” are just some of the phrases that have commonly been used to describe social housing estates and their tenants.

The Grenfell Tower tragedy in 2017, in which 72 people died brought to the fore of public consciousness, the stigma experienced by social housing tenants as well as the ineffective and discriminatory complaint procedures in social housing. This led on to the Social Housing Green Paper, published by the Government in the summer of 2018, which highlighted stigma in social housing as a significant issue which needed to be addressed. 

While the Grenfell fire and the White Paper cast some light on stigma as an issue, little was known about the nature of social housing stigma. Why should people have to face this type of stigmatisation just because they live in social housing? What is the impact of this type of stigma on the lives of social housing tenants? How is it challenged?

Seeking answers to these questions led us on a journey – meeting with residents, speaking with housing associations and landlords, advocacy agencies and government officials, and reviewing how the media typically treats this issue. This resulted in our report titled “Stigma and Social Housing in England” which we published in July 2021. The report highlighted the complexity of social housing stigma as it intersects with other stigmas such as poverty, mental health, race, drugs and crime stigmas. It also highlighted how stigma is driven by political rhetoric, housing policy which residualises social housing and promotes home ownership while depleting social housing stock through the right to buy and a lack of investment in social housing as well as the absence of a strong tenant voice to advocate for the rights and interests of tenants.

Following the publication of this report, we opened up a sector-wide consultation on a number of issues which we felt were central to addressing stigma. The questions focused on the status of housing as a right, challenging and changing negative rhetoric on social housing from politicians and the media; creating a strong tenant voice and empowering tenants, changing the power imbalance between landlords and tenants and making landlords more accountable to tenants. In September 2022 we published our analysis of the consultation responses in a report titled “Stigma and Social Housing in England: feedback on the consultation responses” as well as a policy briefing, titled “Reducing social housing stigma in England: recommendations for the housing sector”.

In this blog, we highlight a few of the key issues from our report and their implications for housing policy.

Housing should be viewed as a right… 

In “Stigma and Social Housing in England: feedback on the consultation responses”, our respondents specifically noted that there needs to be a radical shift from housing being seen as a symbol of wealth to one in which adequate housing is considered a basic and fundamental human right. Taking seriously the idea of housing as a fundamental human right would entail a complete rethink of the purpose of social housing and more particularly it would mean:

1. Moving away from policies of residualisation of social housing and the promotion of home ownership as a more superior tenure than renting.
2. Placing a responsibility on government to provide adequate housing for everyone. This would need significant investment in social housing as well as the halting of policies such as the right to buy which deplete social housing stock.
3. Social housing should be available to all households including all those squeezed into the private rental sectors. 
4. Recognise the intersection of social housing stigma with other stigmas and develop policy measures that adopt a holistic approach to challenge the stigma in social housing.

Affordability of housing should be at the core of government housing policies to ensure the provision of social homes that meet the needs of a diverse set of people.

Political rhetoric…

In both “Stigma and Social Housing in England” and “Stigma and Social Housing in England: feedback on the consultation responses”, our responders overwhelmingly pointed out that politicians primarily drove the intensification of stigma in social housing in two ways. First, is that politicians use stigmatising language to justify their housing, particularly to residualise social housing and to project homeownership as a viable tenure to desire. Secondly, our responders argued that politicians stigmatise social housing residents in a bid to justify welfare reforms. They agreed that the stigmatising narrative from politicians and policymakers is a key driver of the negative media narrative on social housing, and this needs to change to build a sustainable and inclusive housing system. To address this, a few things need to happen

1. Political will and policy need to be directed towards tackling stigma. This implies that policymakers need to be held accountable when found to have directly stigmatised social housing and its occupants.
2. Politicians need to set the right tone to shape the societal perception of social housing and the media stereotyping narrative of social housing.
3. To tackle stigma, policymakers need to adopt a collaborative approach to understand who lives in social housing and their everyday realities to inform housing policies. Indeed, given the intersectionality and complexity of stigma, unless there is a joined up approach to tackling stigma which involves tackling other associated stigmas it is unlikely that much progress will be made.

Accountability to Tenants…

The power imbalance between landlords and tenants is not new, and has previously been highlighted in the social housing green paper and in our initial report “Stigma and Social Housing in England”. This imbalance is driven in part by the nature of regulation of social housing. The weak regulation of the consumer standards and the marginalization of tenants in the co-regulatory arrangements in the sector has meant that power is placed in the hands of the landlords and a space is created in which landlords can deliver poor services and stigmatise tenants with impunity. To address this, a few things need to happen:

1. Refocusing social housing regulation to reflect the interests of the tenants.
2. Involve tenants in the co-regulation of the sector. Particularly, tenants have to be involved in the setting of service standards and the assessment of performance in relation to those standards.

Stronger tenant voices…

In both “Stigma and Social Housing in England” and “Stigma and Social Housing in England: feedback on the consultation responses”, our responders agreed that there was a distinct lack of tenant voice at a local, regional and national levels. Tenants need to be placed at the centre of policies and practices that affects them and they should be given substantive opportunity to shape those policies and improve the services that affect them. To promote a culture of inclusivity and democratic accountability, effective tenant panels and associations should be encouraged by housing providers, professional and trade bodies, the regulators; and feedback from these groups should be taken seriously to improve services and tenants’ experiences. 

In addition, participants in this consultation noted that the lack of an effective voice means that tenants do not have the power, mechanisms, resources or structure to lobby, challenge or help steer housing policies and regulations at the regional and national levels. 

At the regional and national levels, tenants’ voice should be established for the tenants and with the tenants, with the operations independently managed by the tenants. This will ensure that power and voice are directly placed in the hands of the tenants and not in the hands of any third parties with limited power to advocate for them.

Mission Drift…

Finally, one of the issues which featured strongly in the consultation’s responses was the sense that social landlords had lost sight of their “social mission” and had become more focused on making profits than on challenging politicians and the government to improve the lived experiences of social housing residents. By putting profits before people, tenants felt, that had contributed to poor service delivery and the continued stigmatisation of tenants. There were clear indications that as social landlords became bigger, the mission drift became more pronounced. One thing that can be done here is to limit the size of social landlords to ensure that they remain rooted in the communities which there serve. This would include breaking up larger providers.

Concluding comments…

Building an inclusive and sustainable social housing system devoid of stigma should not be expected overnight because the shift requires needs to happen at both policy level as well as at organisational levels. Stigma in social housing has been perpetuated over decades, and its eradication will require a multifaceted approach with conscious, consistent, deliberate, collective and sustained long-term programmes, policies and partnerships to change people’s perception of social housing and its residents. For this to happen, meaningful actions must be taken by all stakeholders to tackle this deep-rooted problem that affects the everyday realities, the quality of life, and the life chances of social housing and its residents. Some of these actions include:

1. Adopting a rights based approach to housing
2. Investment to significantly increase the social housing stock as well as putting an end to the right to buy and other policies which deplete social housing stock
3. Expanding access to social housing
4. Stronger regulation focused on interests of tenants
5. Independent national, regional and local tenant voice organisations
6. Increased tenant involvement in governance structures of landlords
7. Placing a limit on the size of landlords to ensure that they remain rooted in the communities which they serve and focused on the interests of tenants and communities

About the authors:

Dr. Mercy Denedo is an Assistant Professor in Accounting at Durham University Business School.

Dr. Amanze Ejiogu is a Senior Lecturer in Accounting at the Newcastle University. 

Contact details:Enquiries can be sent to us via [email protected]