The Co-operative Housing Tenure Bill
October 14, 2011
This week MP Jonathan Reynolds introduced the The Co-operative Housing Tenure Bill in the Commons under the Ten Minute Rule. The Bill essentially aims to change the law so that membership of a co-op will give rise to the right to occupy thus ending the 1,000 year convention that it is only through freehold or tenancy that someone can occupy land. For a better explanation read this piece by co-op housing expert David Rodgers on Left Foot Forward.
Property prices have played a central role in the financial crisis which has been rumbling along the last few years. House price inflation is a phenomenon which is talked about all the time but never seriously questioned. Is it some fundamental law of the universe that house prices must, over time, increase? Or is it just a side-effect of our individual pursuit of profit?
To paraphrase Darryl Kerrigan, the buildings in which we live are not houses, they’re homes, and it’s time we started treating them as such and not just as commodities to trade and fight over.
