ABSTRACT
This chapter provides a background to legal conditions. It traces the history of private sector housing renewal through to current concerns with sustainability; discusses issues in housing and health; explores the role of the private rented sector; investigates inequality in housing and homelessness; illustrates the debate surrounding housing asylum seekers; and overviews current issues in fuel poverty and energy efficiency. The chapter is presented as follows:
2.1 History of private sector housing renewal 2.2 Housing and health 2.3 Role of the private rented sector 2.4 Inequality and poor housing conditions 2.5 Homelessness 2.6 Asylum seekers and housing 2.7 Fuel poverty, energy efficiency and conservation
2.1 History of private sector housing renewal
Outline
A background knowledge in the development of private sector housing renewal policies is important in informing an understanding of current housing conditions, law and practice. It is also useful to overview which policies were successful and why, and, conversely, which policies were not so successful, and why. A comprehensive, honest and sensitive overview is useful in developing sustainable new policies. This section, which can only offer a summary of key features and dates, traces the history of private sector housing renewal to its roots in the Victorian public health movement, changes in policy since then, to where it is at now. It seeks to show how much housing policy relates to wider social change and political
ideology, and briefly considers the development of social housing, and is summarised in Table 2.1.
