For the time being my personal anthem will be Femi Kuti’s masterpiece What Will tomorrow Bring – the remixed version naturally.
On Sunday night I wrote about how we were only six days from moving house. On Monday got a text from Jayne saying there was a hitch do do with the electrics at the new house. Nothing to stop us moving, but it would delay it for a while. Having already booked the lorry for Saturday, arranged for a new cooker and bed to be delivered to the new address, and with a Virgin engineer scheduled to turn up on moving day this was a bit of a disaster.
After work I went round to the new place so we could all discuss it and try to work out what to do. It literally took me five minutes to walk there from work, reminding me of one reason I want to move there. We had a plan, but not a great deal of confidence it would work. I was so distracted that I went into work and forgot my security pass!
It sounds like a trivial thing, but I was very proud of getting close to four years working on the site without forgetting my pass once and having to go to security for an idiot’s pass. It was especially annoying because our passes are used to buy things in the canteen and vending machines.
All day I was waiting for news of what outcomes our swappees had with the housing association, ombudsman, and all the other people they were talking to.  Not that I would get news anyway since I don’t get a mobile signal at work.  When I left for the day I called Jayne and she told me that everything was sorted and we were all set for moving on Saturday after all.
I’m not sure I dare believe it, and will not be totally comfortable until I am in there and busy erecting shelves, but for now it all looks good.
Best of luck to you, mate.
In all this have you caught up with the CSR yet?
Sort of. Very poor.
Talking of which, after we settle in I think I’ll have to have my own CSR because this move hasn’t done much for my own deficit!
CSR makes a good read whether you agree with it or not.
Most interesting of course is Labour/Boris Johnson’s reaction/ranting on about the housing benefit cap. Interestingly not a single Labour candidate at the General Election thought this was a bad idea (so far as I can tell – I’m open to correction on this) when it was in Labour’s manifesto for the General Election……..
Gordon, there are caps and caps. The coalition are setting one at the 30th percentile of local market values, while increasing social rents to 80% of the market rate. The headline cap of £400pw is not going to affect nearly as many people as those two changes will.
Danivon – Social rents at 80% of market value are for new tenancies and not existing ones – and to quote the Labour manifesto “Housing Benefit will be reformed to ensure that we do not subsidise people to live in the private sector on rents that other ordinary working families could not afford.” So, what would Labour have done then?
Can’t say that I know, it looks fairly vague to me. Probably deliberately so. By now you should realise what happens when you make specific pre-election pledges (*cough* tuition fees *cough*)
Impressed that you know that it was the same as what you and your new pals the Tories came up with.
And… if people are forced out of private rented accommodation over the HB caps, they’ll be ore likely to end up being new tenants in social housing, won’t they?
A similar, but longer, answer can be found here
Interesting article that one skuds. Don’t say I agree with it all but genuinely interesting.
As an aside I’m trying to track down properties that cost more than £400 a week to rent (ie the proposed Housing Benefit cap figure) in the Crawley travel to work area that you and I would both agree were ones for “ordinary working families”.
Any ideas where they may be?
Shouldn’t you be looking for the 31st percentile, as that’s the cap you want us to ignore, but will be the one most likely to apply?
Danivon. Any advance on 31st percentile? You talked of 30% earlier! Basically the exact percentile has not yet been decided on.
Any answers to the £400 a week rental question I posed above – or are you getting as cloudy on the facts as that ex-MP t’oop north!
30th? 31st? That is really splitting hairs. Even I (who rarely gets further into the newspaper than the Times crossword) have seen this figure of capping HB at the 30th percentile of local private rents – so if the cap is at the 30th percentile then the 31st percentile is the one where a gap starts opening up.
I would be very surprised if there was a single ‘normal’ place being rented for anything close to £400 a week here. Maybe some luxurious furnished places aimed at company lets.
Average would be about £800-£900 a month for an ex-council 3-bedroom place. Split the difference and say about £200 a week.
Social rents are currently around £100-£120 for a 3-bed place – which would presumably rise to £160 for new tenants. i.e. at least £170 a month more.
When we put out a leaflet in April predicting lower rises than that we were accused by young Titmuss of scaremongering.
Exactly, Skuds. Gordon is playing dumb. It really doesn’t become you, Mr Seekings. Not as bad as John Hemmings in the Gruan today, claiming that increasing tuition fees from £3K to £6-9K was the same as abolishing them.
Anyway, are you still an employee of the Lib Dems, Gordon? Being paid to put out disinformation for this shambolic government, huh? I told you that the Orange Book was influential, but you waved it off. Everyone has a price, I guess.