The return of class war conservatism? Housing under the UK Coalition Government

Abstract

The May 2010 election of a Conservative-dominated UK coalition government unleashed an unprecedented austerity drive under the auspices of ‘deficit reduction’ in the wake of the global financial crisis. This article focuses on housing policy to show how the ‘cuts’ are being used as an ideological cover for a far-reaching, market-driven restructuring of social welfare policy that amounts to a return of what Ralph Miliband called ‘class war conservatism’. We revisit the main ideological contours and materialist drivers of Thatcherism as a hegemonic strategy, discussing the central role played by housing privatization in the neoliberal project that was continued, but not completed, by New Labour. We then discuss the Coalition’s assault on the housing welfare safety net it inherited, arguing this has rapidly shut down alternative directions for housing and represents a strategic intervention designed to unblock and expand the market, complete the residualization of social housing and draw people into an ever more economically precarious housing experience in order to boost capitalist interests.

London's housing crisis and its activisms

“…For the last three and a half decades, social rental housing in the UK has been in long-term decline, propelled by waves of 'roll back' Thatcherite and 'roll out' New Labour neoliberalism (Peck and Tickell 2002;, and the 'return of class war Conservatism' (Hodkinson and Robbins 2013) under recent Coalition and Conservative governments. As we write, this neoliberalisation process is reaching some kind of peak/nadir as a result of the Housing and Planning Bill 2015-16 which is working its way through Parliament and is predicted will effectively mean 'the end of council housing' as we know it (Harris 2015).…”

Self-Build Homes

“…Whilst social housing was never designed to be universal -seemingly the 'wobbly pillar' (Torgersen, 1987) of the welfare state -nowhere can we see the retrenchment and residualisation of welfare and the 'roll out' of new opportunities for capital more prominently than in housing (Hodkinson and Robbins, 2012). Flint defines this new moment of welfare reform as 'the articulation of new forms of social contract enacted through housing ' (2015, 41), whereby the splintering and reconfiguring of the welfare state and the reciprocal agreement between state and society has been mobilised by the government itself.…”

Whatever happened to compassionate Conservatism under the Coalition government?

“…Secondly, there was an attempt to counter New Labour's position by bringing the Conservative Party towards the political centre on issues such as the NHS and social divisions, while also making clear a difference between the parties on the role and responsibilities of the state, and of individuals, communities and society. Hodkinson and Robbins (2012) argue that in their 2010 general election manifesto the Conservatives sugar-coated 'their agenda for "public spending control" with the compassionate one-nation rhetoric of "we are all in this together"' (p. 64), while McAnulla (2010) suggests that prior to the 2010 general election Cameron had not only 'moved the Conservatives onto the broad territory staked out in New Labour's third way' (p. 311), but also contended that they were best placed to defend third way themes. Even following The combination of symbols and substance, and the different arguments and assertions made by the advocates of a new direction, as well as the unwillingness to produce precise promises and commitments that might allow the development of critiques and alienate potential allies, meant that, as Bale (2013) notes, Conservative modernisation 'was always heavier on diagnosis than on prescription' (p. 135), and made the extent of change hard to assess.…”