My mouldy house will kill my sick baby | Rent Seeking #6

Ronnie and Ellie can't escape their mouldy rental property - which means they can't bring their sick son home.

Arthur was born with rare genetic disorders that have left him requiring a liver transplant, following which he'll be on immunosuppressants for life.

Doctors have advised the new parents that it's not safe for their son Arthur home from hospital due to the mould and damp in their property, which they say their landlord won't address. They now stay in Ronald McDonald charity housing near the hospital, while paying for their private rental property in Everton.

Having had to give up their jobs to care for their son, they can't afford to move into a new private rental.

And, due to the housing crisis, it may be years before a suitable social rental becomes available.

The most recent data shows 12,764 households are on the city’s social housing waiting list.

Liverpool City Council doesn't directly own many council houses anymore. Housing Associations own tens of thousands of homes in the city and charge social rents linked to local incomes.

Ellie and Ronnie say that few housing association properties meet the needs of their son, such as adequate ambulance access. And, when those that do meet them become available, they're often 100th in the queue for the council's allocation consideration, despite being in Band A priority.

In this episode of Rent Seeking, PoliticsJOE visited Ellie and Ronnie alongside Lib Dem councillor Carl Cashman, who's been advocating for the couple.

Cashman says Ellie and Ronnie's story, sadly, isn't unusual in Liverpool, due to rising rents and a lack of social house and council house building in the City.

In the 1974, councils directly delivered nearly 100,000 social rent homes. Following years of funding cuts, many councils were forced to shut down their building operations, transfer their council stock to housing associations. The number of social rent homes built by housing associations has decreased dramatically since 2010. In 2022/23, under 10,00 social rent homes were built.

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