Background
By Jas Bains, Hafod Chief Executive
Background
Multi-generational living historically has been associated with necessity, and its affordability is still a key asset. But now, more than just providing a temporary solution to economic challenges, the multi-generational household has evolved into an arrangement that mutually benefits family members. In an increasingly diverse society, our housing solutions need to suit different cultures, generations and lifestyles. By allowing the market to dictate what should be built is simply not going to resolve our housing crisis. And such is the policy fixation with increasing housing supply alternative ideas and solutions remain on the periphery. Yet the reality is the monetisation of adult social care and childcare has made it prohibitively expensive and out of range for many not only lower income but also middle income earning groups. A rebalancing of the housing market, reflecting both supply as well as demand side solutions has to be the way forward.
I get the need to satisfy younger people and families frozen out of the housing market, but is setting false expectations a fair and responsible course of action? It is noted that some national governments have started to subtly drop housebuilding targets, perhaps a new reality is dawning and/or is the issue related to the climate change agenda? Picking up threads from COP 28 discussions I understand that the housing challenge cannot be solved by infinite supply as we don’t have the national carbon budgets for this. Experts say it depends on how much zero carbon electricity generation we want to build. On the operational carbon side theoretically yes but not really on the embodied carbon side and apparently we are nowhere close to the energy requirements in the timescales of carbon reduction needed. A solution is to build lots more low carbon generation, much, much faster we are currently planning to.
Compared with other parts of Europe such as Spain, Netherlands, France, Denmark and Germany the United Kingdom lacks a coherent policy approach to multi-generation housing. There are over 450 such purpose-built multigenerational housing projects across Germany and the Mehrgenerationenhaus programme is a key part of Germany’s older people’s strategy, which promotes the idea that old people and young people within a community can mutually support each other. For over a decade federal government has provided the funding where everyone has their own room or flat and common rooms for shared activities. In Spain, ‘Vive y Convive’ subsidises the costs of elderly people who act as hosts. And in the Netherlands, the government has developed a competitive financing scheme under the social housing experimentation unit (SEV).
I would argue the tried and tested approaches are limited without having regard to wider societal challenges and surrounding environment. The very nature of which have become more complex against a backdrop of diminishing public sector resources and a disturbing picture of increased poverty, inequalities and wellbeing. I am surprised social housing investors, who themselves underwent a major stress testing process in the face of the 2009 global economic clash, have not done the same for housing associations in the current operating environment. Assets and balance sheets continue to be evaluated in bricks and mortar currency when so much around them has changed.
The New Bauhaus Movement argue that we need to extend the reuse of vacant spaces, adaptive reuse, lightweight rooftops extensions and retrofitting buildings. What the last few years have taught us is that how and what we account for, how we interact with and use spaces, how we live and work, and how we design our built environment has fundamentally changed. The new economics around it point to how a house can be understood not just in relation to the people who live in it, but also in terms of the goods and products that flow through it, and extending to how we incentivise the sharing of spaces and resources.
As Housing Associations we need to think about designing ‘Streets of the Future’ with joint communal kitchens and community food growing projects that adapt to food scarcities and reduce loneliness, shared energy zones to tackle fuel poverty and drive-up thermal insulation standards, co-working space nurturing entrepreneurship alongside the primary care led social prescribing and public health lifestyle projects. Where barriers and obstacles are identified we should deploy regulatory sandbox mechanisms to enable testing, piloting and prototyping.
The essence of the famous African (Benin) proverb: ‘It takes a village’ is that local communities are key to the health and wellbeing of all who live in those neighbourhoods. In reality, there are always going to be the sick, infirm and income poor groups, but that does not mean they do not have something to offer even if that may not be immediately. To paraphrase another famous saying which talks about how there is a treasure trove in all of us. It comes down to not just where but also how we look.