Category Archives: Housing

‘It’s a miracle’: Helsinki’s radical solution to homelessness

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Finland is the only EU country where homelessness is falling. Its secret? Giving people homes as soon as they need them – unconditionally

Tatu Ainesmaa turns 32 this summer, and for the first time in more than a decade he has a home he can truly say is his: an airy two-room apartment in a small, recently renovated block in a leafy suburb of Helsinki, with a view over birch trees.

“It’s a big miracle,” he says. “I’ve been in communes, but everyone was doing drugs and I’ve had to get out. I’ve been in bad relationships; same thing. I’ve been on my brother’s sofa. I’ve slept rough. I’ve never had my own place. This is huge for me.”

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Peterborough prepares for byelection that could elect first Brexit party MP

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A decade ago it was the UK’s fastest growing city, but hit by cuts and buy-to-let, support for Nigel Farage’s party is high

On Thursday, voters in Peterborough will take part in one of the most intriguing parliamentary byelections in recent memory. The constituency saw a knife-edge duel between Labour and the Conservatives at the 2017 general election and at last month’s European poll, 38% of voters in the city backed the Brexit party. A first seat in the House of Commons for Nigel Farage’s party is a distinct possibility. If that happens, it will send tremors through middle England, of which Peterborough is typical in many ways, not just geographically.

Economically, Peterborough performs averagely amid struggles with productivity. Wages are stagnant and it has been reshaped by migration, with foreigners arriving to work in the surrounding farmlands and distribution depots, contributing to a decade as the UK’s fastest growing city between 2001 and 2011.

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Goodbye to Gomorrah: the end of Italy’s most notorious housing estate

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Famous as the setting for the hit film and TV series Gomorrah, the towers of Le Vele became synonymous with poverty and organised crime – until residents took charge

“When I think of my life in Le Vele, my skin crawls with rage,” says Omero Benfenati.

He looks out from a dark, narrow passageway framed by suspended steel stairways that block the natural light and lead up to abandoned apartments. Most of the windows are bricked up, and liquid leaks from split pipes on to the sewage and refuse-strewn asphalt several storeys below.

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Federal election 2019: Labor’s Belinda Hassan target of suspected arson attack – politics live

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The ALP’s candidate for Dawson confirms ‘scary incident’ where the fuel tank of her car was broken into. All the day’s events, live

And then it ends with this:

PK: Finally, you want to remove Josh Frydenberg, who fought hard for the National Energy Guarantee and for a compromise to move forward on climate change and energy. Is that a smart move?

Patricia Karvelas: One of the critiques of you is past involvement in Link Energy’s purchase of fossil fuel assets in 2010. Do you regret that?

Oliver Yates: I think the question is you need to see it was a company who bought them before I was even on the board. This is part of the Liberal dirt sheet. It’s round to everybody...

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Labor says it will match Coalition’s deposit scheme for first home buyers

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Chris Bowen says the opposition can afford the policy because it is ‘closing loopholes’ for the wealthy

Labor will match Scott Morrison’s election pitch to first home buyers, saying it can afford to support the government’s home deposit scheme because it is “closing loopholes” for the wealthy.

After the Coalition used its campaign launch on Sunday to announce the new housing affordability measure, Labor’s shadow treasurer, Chris Bowen, criticised the government for the 11th-hour decision, but supported the proposal.

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Housing in sub-Saharan Africa improves but millions of people live in slums

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Study identifies major transformation in quality of living conditions, but governments urged to improve urban sanitation

From cities to the countryside, Africa has undergone a dramatic transformation in living conditions over the past 15 years, according to a new study.

But the research, based on state of the art mapping and published in science journal Nature, also found that almost half of the the urban population – 53 million people across the countries analysed – were living in slum conditions.

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Australian house prices down in every capital city except Adelaide and Hobart

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ABS data shows capital city prices fell 2.4% in December quarter and 5.1% over 2018

Home prices across Australia’s capital cities fell by 2.4% in the three months to December, trimming the total value of the country’s dwellings to $6.7tn.

Prices fell 5.1% across the whole of 2018, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics’ Residential Property Price Index, released on Tuesday.

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‘Beggars in our own land’: Canada’s First Nation housing crisis

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In January, an isolated reserve declared a state of emergency over dangerously poor housing conditions. A resident has now died – what will it take for meaningful change?

A caravan of trucks carrying material for new homes is currently winding through northern Ontario, on its way to a remote Indigenous community. The trip along a seasonal winter road is a slow one, passing over frozen lakes and muskeg, and involves cutting down trees along the way for the vehicles and their trailers. Members of the isolated reserve, Cat Lake First Nation, say there is no time to waste.

Home to roughly 700 people, the reserve declared a state of emergency in January over excessive mould, leaky roofs and other poor housing conditions. The crisis then deepened when one of its residents, 48-year-old Nashie Oombash, died from respiratory issues. Her family blamed the death on extensive mould problems in her home.

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Sale of portable cabins booms in New Zealand amid housing crisis

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People turn to tiny structures that can be placed in the gardens of family or friends’ properties

The sale of portable cabins is booming in New Zealand, where a housing crisis means hundreds of thousands of Kiwis can no longer afford a home, or even a rental.

Soaring property prices in New Zealand’s largest cities and a slow pace of new builds has seen many low and middle income New Zealanders struggling to afford basic housing, with some forced to sleep in shipping containers, tents and cars.

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Lisbon’s bad week: police brutality reveals Portugal’s urban reality

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A viral video of police violence has brought national attention to the long-ghettoised community in Bairro da Jamaica

From time to time, cars of curious people drive slowly though Bairro da Jamaica, craning their necks for a peek at the neighbourhood that’s been in the headlines across Portugal for several days now. None of them step out of their vehicles.

They’re here to look at the broken glass, the smashed roof tiles and the evidence of last week’s violence. The tallest of the bairro’s self-built housing towers is now derelict, fenced off with yellow tape and awaiting demolition; the others are also scheduled to be torn down, but are still occupied for now.

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Spike in deaths of Oxford rough sleepers rocks community

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Friends cite lack of support in university town for those with mental health and addiction problems

A spate of deaths has rocked the homeless community in Oxford, sparking warnings that a lack of housing and support for people with mental health and addiction problems in one of Britain’s most affluent cities is contributing to fatalities.

Bereaved friends of four men and a woman who have died suddenly in the university city since November said the losses are the worst they have known. They fear further deaths among rough sleepers amid freezing temperatures.

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Orkney rated Britain’s best place to live in terms of quality of life

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Scotland and north of England dominate top five as measured by housing, crime and schools

Orkney is the best place to live in the UK, with cheap houses, low crime, good schools and a population who are among the happiest and healthiest in the country, according to the annual Halifax quality of life survey.

The survey found that all the top five best places to live in the UK were in Scotland or the north of England. Richmondshire in the north of the Yorkshire Dales came second, while the appropriately named Eden district in Cumbria was third.

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Baghdad at 10 million: fragile dreams of normality as megacity status beckons

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The next 15 megacities #1: Iraq’s capital remains a profoundly damaged place, but the city feels more stable these days – at times even vibrant

After an exhausting journey through Baghdad’s vast and grimy suburbs, the pastel-coloured blocks of Besmaya Dream City rise up above the rushes just beyond one of the modern gates marking the edge of the city.

The orderliness of these dozens of towers – some lived in, some unfinished – is a shock in the otherwise chaotic jumble of low-rise cityscape. The residential complex is being built by a South Korean company, Hanwha, and will house 100,000 people once its delayed construction is complete.

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Senate passes flood insurance extension hours before deadline

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The Senate passed a four-month extension to the National Flood Insurance Program Tuesday, less than a day before the program was set to expire. The bill, which had originated in the House, will now go to President Trump, who has until midnight to sign it to avoid a lapse in the program.