Islington council houses family on benefits in £1.8 MILLION property… with …

Posted on by Listify Me

  • Islington council renovating Grade II-listed residence for Indian couple
  • Five-bedroom townhouse has games room, three bathrooms and 40ft garden
  • Private rent would earn £2,000 a week – but welfare family will pay less than £1,000 a month

  • London borough has had a
    £52m cut in funding for 2011 to 2013

By
Nick Enoch


PUBLISHED:

09:38 GMT, 4 June 2012

|

UPDATED:

11:14 GMT, 4 June 2012

A family living on benefits is being moved to a £1.8 million townhouse – which is being renovated for them at the taxpayers’ expense – provoking outrage.

Islington council is converting the four-storey Grade II-listed property into one house after it had been split into two flats.

If rented privately the council-owned property could earn around £2,000 a week but when the family move in after the renovation – which itself will cost thousands – they will be paying less than £1,000 a month.

The Indian couple, believed to be in their 30s, with four children and another on the way, are said to be amazed by their luck.

Islington council is converting this £1.8m property into one house after it had been split into two flats. An Indian couple on benefits will move in and pay less than £1,000 in rent. It could have brought in £2,000 in the private sector

The London borough has had a £52m cut in funding for 2011 to 2013 – and locals want the property in Granville Square, Clerkenwell, to be sold to raise money

And they’ll certainly enjoy the run of their new home, in Granville Square, Clerkenwell in north London – once part of the former borough of Finsbury.

The five-bedroom Victorian residence has a games room on the top floor, a huge living room, three bathrooms, fitted kitchen, a 40ft garden – and access to a residents-only play area including a basketball court.

One neighbour, Kelly Gladwell, 40, told
the Sun: ‘It’s disgusting. The council should sell it off privately and
build several homes for people who really need them.’

Another resident, Dolores Murphy, 63,
added: ‘We were all surprised the council was giving a family the whole
house. I have four daughters, all born in Islington, who had to move
out of London to afford rent. It’s so unfair.’

The London borough has had a £52million cut in funding for 2011 to 2013 – and locals want the property to be sold in order to raise money.

Meanwhile, the soon-to-be-housed couple have been making regular visits to monitor progress on their new home.

A builder working on site said the family was delighted and couldn’t believe their good fortune.

Robert Oxley, of the TaxPayers’ Alliance told the paper: ‘It’s barmy for the council to spend so much just so one family can live there. It should focus on providing affordable housing.’

A spokesman for Islington Council told the Daily Express: ‘This particular property has been allocated to an Islington family who are currently severely overcrowded.

‘All of our available council properties are advertised online so anyone in need of a council home can apply.’

AND THEY’RE NOT THE ONLY LUCKY ONES…

In contrast to the case above, where the council has charged the couple a relatively modest London rental rate, there have been several instances in recent years where properties owned by private landlords have been used to house families on benefits – at a great cost to taxpayers…

A mother of eight told of her ‘great’ life in a £2.6million home funded by taxpayers.

Francesca Walker receives more than £90,000 a year in benefits to pay the rent on the five-bed villa, plus other payouts.

She insisted she would rather live in a normal council house, but added: ‘I’m not going to pretend this isn’t great.’

Mother of eight Francesca Walker was placed in a £2.6m house in Notting Hill, west London at the taxpayers’ expense

Miss Walker, 33, has Tory leader David Cameron, actor Hugh Grant and Four Weddings writer Richard Curtis as neighbours in fashionable Notting Hill, West London.

Her four-storey home boasts five bedrooms, three bathrooms, a double living room, study and roof terrace.

Speaking in 2009, Miss Walker said: ‘All my life I’ve lived in overcrowded flats on estates with gangs that kicked our door in and harassed my children.

‘We lived in some hellholes. One stank so badly we couldn’t use two rooms. Another had a gas leak that made my children ill.’

Miss Walker, whose children range from five to 16, was given the house because a new rule introduced by the Government in April forces Kensington and Chelsea council to fund suitable homes for large families.

None of the available council houses was big enough, so the local authority pays for her to rent from a private landlord.

Miss Walker admitted the move had caused ‘a lot of jealousy’.

A single mother with three children was placed by her local council in a £1.5million mews house four years ago.

The luxurious three-storey property, in the heart of London’s exclusive Kensington, costs an astonishing £1,125 a week to rent – a cost being met by housing benefit, at taxpayers’ expense.

Appalled neighbours said the house concerned is the biggest on the central yet quiet street. Boston Ivy climbs its walls, and it features a juliet balcony and a large garage.

A single mother with three children was placed by her local council in a £1.5m mews house in Kensington, west London, four years ago

… and an Afghan woman and her seven children have also lived at public expense in a £1.2million house in Acton, west London – at a cost of £2,875 a week to taxpayers.

The seven-bedroom home in Acton, West London, where an Afghan family were placed at a cost of £2,875 a week to taxpayers

Iain Duncan Smith said a new housing cap will come into force next April

More than 100 families on benefits are living in luxury homes

More than 11,000 households are raking
in benefits that are at least the equivalent of a higher rate
taxpayers’ £47,000 salary, it was revealed last month.

The
figure was disclosed by Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith
before letters were sent to households explaining a new cap on
benefits under which no one can claim more than the average annual
working wage of £26,000.

The
cap comes into force next April and aims to remove the disincentive to
work that leaves many of the unemployed better off on benefits.

According to official figures, at
least 100 families on benefits are living in luxury homes, with many
receiving housing handouts of about £5,000 per month – enough to fund a
£1million mortgage.

Households
exempt from the cap include those where there are  people in work and
claiming working tax credits, and families that are deemed to be very
vulnerable – including war widows and those claiming disability living
allowance.

People who
have lost their job but were employed for 12 months or more prior to
claiming benefits will have nine months’ grace before the cap applies.

Jonathan
Isaby, of the TaxPayers’ Alliance, said: ‘Many taxpayers struggling to
make ends meet will find it incredibly unfair that some people are
drawing more in benefits than they’ve ever actually earned themselves. 

‘The
welfare system needs to provide a safety net for the poorest and most
vulnerable in society, but these figures demonstrate that the current
system has got out of control and that the Government’s proposed
benefits cap needs to be introduced as a matter of urgency.’

The
Prime Minister has also said it is ‘time to call time’ on excessive
benefits. David Cameron said in January: ‘It’s a basic issue of
fairness. Should people really be able to earn more than £26,000 just
through benefits alone?

‘I don’t believe they should. And I think the overwhelming majority of people in the country would back that view.’

Ministers
will overhaul the tax and benefits system from October next year, when a
universal credit will be introduced to simplify the system and replace
swathes of tax credits and benefits.

They
claim it will ensure that no one will be better off on benefits than in
work, removing the so-called ‘cliff edge’ where those who take on
part-time work end up worse off as benefits are removed.

But
critics have warned that families affected by the benefits cap could
lose their homes, as around 44 per cent of those set to be hit are
living in social housing.

David
Orr, of the National Housing Federation, said: ‘The letters will come
as a shock to many vulnerable families. The overall benefit cap is a
crude measure that fails to reflect the stark differences in housing
costs across the country caused by the desperate shortage of affordable
housing.’

He called on
councils to share information they had on who could be affected so that
housing associations could offer help. ‘With under a year to go before
many people start losing their homes, there’s no time to lose,’ he
added.

Mr
Duncan Smith said: ‘For more than ten years Labour let the benefits
bill soar, and these figures show the scale of the problem.

‘It is absurd that people are able to claim as much on benefits as a higher rate taxpayer earns.

‘The welfare state should work as a safety net and then support people to financial independence.

‘Our
welfare reforms will make sure a life in work always pays more than a
life on benefits, and are a clear illustration that this Government is
on the side of people who work hard, do the right thing and aspire to a
better life.’

The 11,000 households exposed by Mr
Duncan Smith enjoy benefits of more than £34,000 a year, equating to a
gross wage of £47,000. This is enough to put most employees into the
higher rate 40p tax band.

Here’s what other readers have said. Why not add your thoughts,
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The comments below have been moderated in advance.



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Stop now you idiots!!!!!! You are distorting the property market and encouraging inequality in our society. There are many genuine singles living (and working), in London paying 5, 6, and £700 a month for ONE room, out of their OWN money with little to no chance of ever owning their own home, or renting a house at an affordable rent. We have had a housing shortage since the end of WW2 and is being sustained by greed and vested interests. This is one social problem all politicians have failed to tackle.

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Whilst most of us are working hard making ends meet, others are breeding recklessness whilst we the tax payers again have to foot the bill. If you cant support your child then dont have them. We are not living in the 19th century anymore where birth motility was high and children had to work to feed the family.

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Any government worth the name would deal with this overnight by taking immediate measures on capping, not waiting until next April, even then it will be kicked along until the next election in 2015. Parliament should have the final say on this, where there is an appeal from the public, but in reality, this is all about capturing the minority vote, local and national.

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And me a full time employed tax payer still lives at home as I can’t afford a mortgage for a one bedroom flat. The benefits system in this country is a joke. Britain is dead.

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I’m seething, as I’m sure are many others, my only consolation being I can at least say in private what you can’t or wouldn’t print.

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This is a council property and as such it is their duty to make repairs to it, however they could have left the property as two flats and housed two families instead of one. I also believe that there is no such thing as overcrowding, if people have a roof over their heads then they are lucky (especially in this climate) and having extra children without having the means to care for them properly is irresponsible.

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Wonder what the new major of Islington thinks Jilani Chowdhury? There are plenty of people homeless or overcrowded in Islington. No one forces people to breed without the means to support themselves. Why do they keep being rewarded for their irresponsible behaviour? The laws to to be revised to reward sensible people instead.

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Meanwhile our wounded and disabled soldiers are give flats at the TOP of multi storey buildings. It beggars belief.

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Que the usual comments about benefits scroungers etc. What you omitted to mention DM is that this is extremely rare – 11,000 households is NOT representative of benefit recipients in the UK. Most benefit claimants have to make do with living in sub standard hovels as not many landlords accept Housing Benefit tenants. The irony in this is that “people who have lost their job but were employed for 12 months or more prior to claiming benefits will have nine months’ grace before the cap applies”… in other words, if someone is made redundant through no fault of their own, they will have to move out of their present home and live where exactly? Where are they going to find alternative accommodation and pay advance fees (deposit, rent in advance etc.) when they have no money?

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sounds about right. put people up in luxury homes while clamping down on the sick.

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