ROOF Blog

Net migration – the number of people who come to live in Britain minus the number who move abroad – fell by more than a third to 163,000 last year, its lowest level since Poland joined the European Union.

The Office for National Statistics said the fall from 233,000 in 2007 was mainly driven by a rise in emigration to a 17-year high: 427,000 people left Britain to live abroad, up from 341,000 the previous year.

The increase was mainly due to the number of Poles returning home.

Asylum figures show a further fall in the number of fresh claims for refugee status between July and September this year to 5,055 – a decline of 24 per cent compared with the same period in 2008.

Refugee welfare groups said the fall in asylum numbers was not necessarily a matter of celebration but raised fears that the tightening up of Britain’s borders was denying sanctuary to those who needed protection.

Communities secretary John Denham has announced a £70 million migration impact fund, funded by a levy on migrants, that will be used to tackle illegal working practices and reduce local pressure on public services. Nearly 200 projects will receive funding with every region benefitting, but the amounts each receives will be weighted towards areas where migrants have had the greatest short-term impact. Funding in housing is being targeted on cracking down on rogue landlords.

People moving to the UK for work or study from outside the EU will have to pay an extra £50 on top of the visa fee. The two-year scheme, which will raise £70 million to fund more police support and translators, was announced by communities secretary Hazel Blears yesterday. She acknowledged that migrants already contributed to services through taxes, but said the visa fund would provide extra money to ‘ease the transition’ for areas that had seen a big influx of immigrants.

The UK could be home to almost 750,000 illegal immigrants, following an estimated rise in their numbers since 2001, a Home Office study for London mayor Boris Johnson has said. Mr Johnson has called an amnesty for many of them ‘morally right’, although the government has warned that it would become a ‘pull factor’ for more immigrants. The study looked at the economic impact of an amnesty for illegal immigrants and estimated that if a minimum of five years’ residence in the UK was required to qualify, 450,000 illegal immigrants could be granted amnesty.

A new study by the Institute of Public Policy Research has found that there is no evidence to suggest that large-scale migration from eastern Europe since 2004 has had a negative impact on wages or unemployment. Figures out this week from the Homes Office found a 47 per cent drop in the number of migrants coming to the UK from eastern Europe at the end of last year as the recession began to bite.

Almost 1.8 million people have moved to London from abroad in the past decade, the Bank of Scotland has found. However, nearly two million people moved away from the capital to other parts of Britain, the largest number lost to internal migration of any area in the UK. The South East of England was the most popular region for people to move to from elsewhere in the UK, while the North East and North West were the only UK regions to see an overall decline in their population.

Rural communities are struggling to adapt to the ‘unprecendeted’ level of migration of non-UK workers into their areas, says charity Business in the Community.While migrants had brought a number of benefits, helped boost the economy and filled gaps left by Britons who ‘prefered to remain jobless’ there had been an increase of 186 per cent in their numbers in rural communities between 2003 and 2007, which was leading to tensions breaking out and posed challenges to community cohesion and in the provision of adequate housing and services.

A source at the Olympic Delivery Authority has revealed that the authority may be forced to ask for government money earmarked for London’s housing associations to help fund the 2012 Olympic athletes’ village. Land Lease, the developer for the Olympic project, has struggled to raise its half of the £2 billion needed for the village as credit dries up. The company has already scaled back the number of units proposed – from 4,200 to 3,300 – while the ODA chairman last month admitted that the government would have to come in and support the village financially.

The government has pledged £80 million for ’extra care’ housing schemes on 25 sites, aimed at those with dementia. More than 2,000 flats are to be built to buy or rent by elderly and vulnerable people who want care and support services on site, and the option of staying with their partner. The government said it wanted residents to enjoy greater privacy, dignity and independence, while allowing homeowners a chance to keep some equity in their property.

David Blanchflower, a member of the Bank of England’s monetary policy committee, has said that the British economy will fall into a recession that could be deep and painful if interest rates are not cut sharply. He has been voting to cut rates for some time and said he was ‘amazed’ that some of his colleagues wanted to raise rates, as he would like to see them ‘well below’ their current level. He believes the slump in housing prices and the credit crunch are part of the ‘biggest economic problem since the great depression’.

Traditional village life is at risk as people are priced out of the countryside, according to research by the National Housing Federation, as villages become virtual ghettos of the rich and elderly. Most people could not afford to live in the country even if property prices fell dramatically, and the gap has worsened over the past six years – in 10 desirable rural areas the average house price is now more than 15 times the average local income. The federation’s chief executive called for a new target of 9,000 social homes to be built in the countryside a year, plus a duty on councils to consider sustainability before rejecting planning proposals.

Rightmove has released its latest monthly house price survey which shows that the average asking price last month dropped more than £4,300 (approximately 1.8 per cent) while the number of unsold properties reached record levels. In July estate agents had an average of 77 properties for sale, up from 74 in June; and they are spending an average of 87 days on the market before selling, up from 83 days in June. Meanwhile, homeowners in Britain are convinced that the fall in property prices will be higher than elsewhere in the world. Forty-two per cent of homeowners thought prices would fall but an optimistic 15 per cent ould still expected a rise in the year ahead.

Many people fear their prospects are being damaged by pressure on housing and schools from immigrants and their families. Although many valued signs of a more ‘multi-ethnic and multicultural’ country, poverty and lack of opportunities undermined social cohesion. The competition for council housing has been a main area of concern, as the number of people on council house waiting lists has increased by 650,000 to 1.67 million households since Labour came into power.

In London, the biggest council house building programme for a generation has been announced. During the next four years, 526 homes will be built on brownfield sites and underused sites on existing council estates in Westminster – it will include 104 shared ownership flats, 69 affordable starter homes, and 107 homes that will be sold at market price to help fund the scheme.

A parliamentary report has concluded that houses will become unaffordable for millions of Britons as a higher influx of immigrants will mean higher house prices. According to the House of Lords economic affairs committee, if net immigration of 190,000 people per year continues over the next 20 years, it will cause the cost of an average property to rise to more than 10 times the average wage, whereas in 2000, the average cost was only four times the average wage. Ministers now forecast that by 2031 the population will be 71 million, up from 60.6 million in 2006, due to net immigration and this level of immigrations will exert a ‘significant impact on the housing market’.

Gordon Brown is facing his largest backbench revolt since the start of his premiership, over council tax repairs. Thirty Labour MPs have rebelled against the government, to call for more money for council housebuilding and repairs, during the first and second amendment readings to the Housing and Regeneration Bill. Labour MP, Michaal Meacher said that the need for social and affordable housing ‘far exceeds’ government’s plans, and that relying on the public sector to build the required homes was ‘unrealistic’.

In the meantime, the Tories are hoping to use today’s debate on the Bill to force a vote on abandoning home information packs (Hips). Arguing that more than half of the packs are over the target price of £350 and only one in eight is being produced within the predicted time of four to five working days, the conservative housing spokesperson, Grant Shapps, said that ‘everyone involved, be it experts or consumers, recognises that Hips have failed in every aspect’. His views are backed by the National Association of Estate Agents who found that most of its members believe that the packs had not speeded up the selling process or giving buyers any more useful information.

The construction sector has dramatically slowed down to its lowest level in more than a decade, which has put the government’s housing target under threat, according to the latest survey from the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS). RICS said that 1 per cent more surveyors reported a rise in workloads than a fall during the first three months of 2008, compared to 16 per cent for the final three months of last year. The worst hit sector was the private housing market, which suffered negative workload growth for the first time since 1999.

And in research by auction house, Allsop, just four per cent of new build flats sold at auction over the past three years made a profit, with the value of the average flat plunging 26 per cent. Allsop also said that the outlook for new build flats was ‘grim’, and blamed the problem on massive oversupply, set to get worse as the number of distressed sales is rising ‘steeply’. A common problem was found to be buyers not being able to afford to pay their mortgage after failing to find tenants.

And finally, a home in the suburbs can add 12 years to your life. People living in middle class estates on the outskirts of a market town can typically expect to live until they are nearly 90 years old, whereas those living in council estates closer to the centre of the same country town are likely to die before they reach their late 70s.

Businesses are more pessimistic about the economy than any time in the past five years, and threaten to ‘talk the country into a recession’ according to accountants Grant Thornton. Only 14 per cent of the businesses are optimistic about the economy, compared to 43 per cent for the same time last year. In a separate survey, Lloyds TSB found only one in three were optimistic about the year ahead. Global economic uncertainty, fears over falling consumer spending, and lack of skilled workers are cited as the main concerns.

The uncertainty has had an affect on the potential sale of Northern Rock, according to the Sunday Telegraph. Potential buyers need to secure funding of at least £10 billion from investment banks, but as UK house prices fall, the banks are reluctant to lend money. Falling UK house prices have made it harder to estimate the overall value of the property that Northern Rock hold. PM Gordon Brown has insisted that the government is keen to avoid nationalising the bank, and Chancellor Alistair Darling said a decision would be made within six weeks.

In the meantime, the average cost of a home loan has soared to a seven-year high, according to Bank of England data, as mortgage bills are more than 20 per cent higher than two years ago. The typical homeowner is paying £135 a month more for their mortgage than last year, prompting fears of a rise in home repossessions as people struggle to pay debts.

You know times are tough when the Church of England starts dispensing debt advice. Drawing on texts from the bible and specially written prayers, the initiative aims to give hope to those suffering financially before it is ‘too late’.

But it’s not all doom and gloom. A report from Oxford Economics Consultancy has shown that the standard of living in Britain is higher than America for the first time in a century. Increasing incomes, free healthcare and longer holidays make the average Briton better off than their US counterpart. Gross domestic product (GDP) per head (an indicator of average incomes) in the UK is expected to be £23,500 in 2008, compared with £23,250 in America.

However, as many as 4.5 million people have left London and the South East during the past 10 years in search of a better quality of life. The leavers were replaced with a large number of migrants both from other parts of the UK and overseas, mostly young single people who were chasing work. Overall London and the South East had a net population gain of just under 400,000 people.

And finally, a coalition of 15 charities and campaign groups will today release findings of a survey into care for older people. Caring Choices raises concern about the level of funding for the long-term care of the elderly; calls for a simplified system of entitlements; and argues for a more choice in ‘personal care’.