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'systemic failings' in Birmingham City Council's housing supply
People living in 'unimaginable' conditions
A child was reportedly taken to hospital after an asthma attack due to damp in a Birmingham City Council owned property.
Tenants have been living in ‘squalid’ and ‘unsafe conditions’. This was the judgement from Conservative Councillors Ken Wood and Adrian Delaney. They are going to put up a motion at the Full Council meeting on Tuesday to hold the council to account over the conditions their tenants are living in.
This is after Secretary of State Michael Gove called the conditions tenants were living in ‘disgraceful’. The Labour’s Council’s response was to deny this and argue that these claims were historic or resolved. Meanwhile, children in the city are being hospitalised due to damp and mould in their homes.
In the last five years there has been 15,000 complaints of mould and damp, which is 25% of the total housing supply in the city.
Critics of the Council argue that money is wasted on vanity projects like the refurbushment of the floozy in the jacuzzi, yet their housing stock is in ‘unsafe’ conditions. Labour Councillors often play lip-service to issues around poverty and deprivation, but the lives of Birmingham’s poorest has significantly worsened under their time in power. Council tax rises, poor housing, and clean air zone charges that target old second hand cars are all effecting the most vulnerable residents’ quality of life.
Read more about why mould needs to be taken seriously in housing here. Read about how Birmingham City Council likes to weaponize poverty yet makes it worse here.
Written by Jack Dixon