Guernsey Press

'Elephant' of housing issues must be tackled

IN THEIR own different but typically forthright ways, two senior States members make a point today about the island’s housing crisis.

Published

We may describe it as hidden, looming, or already here, depending on our own personal perspective on the housing market today. Or we may not recognise it at all, instead seeing positives in the anecdotal evidence of properties selling at above asking price within 24 hours of going on the market.

Deputy Peter Roffey, with decades in the States behind him, has seen it all in housing. He outlined some of it during the States debate over the new Government Work Plan back in March.

States home loans and the end of that system. Building States houses for rental, and selling a handful of them off into the private sector.

The birth and continued growth of the Guernsey Housing Association, and the ongoing debate as to whether it has proved the unqualified success which some believe it to be.

There have also been stories of people living in their cars. The hidden reality of ‘sofa surfing’ for both the young and not-so-young. Desperate young families looking for somewhere to rent.

Deputy Neil Inder goes for the more direct route. A Facebook video of his unescorted trip around the vacant King Edward VII Hospital led him to believe that direct action on States property is the key to unlock what he called the 'housing crisis'.

Deputy Roffey is calling for a population debate, Deputy Inder appears to favour spades in the ground and the development of homes for families to live in.

What is undoubtedly required is that the broad housing issue can no longer be allowed to drift. It may not be so simple as repurposing empty wards and buildings at the KEVII. It also might not require an initial debate on population size.

But Deputy Roffey today talks about the 'elephant in the room'.

He and Deputy Inder may not always be aligned, but today they surely are when they say that elephant can no longer be ignored by the States. Better awareness of the island’s housing issues will be critical to successful ‘action’ in this term of government.