A think-tank report said that over the previous two decades about £2 billion of council house rents in Wales had been 'confiscated' by the United Kingdom government and used for purposes other than the provision of council housing.
Source: Paul Griffiths, The Great Rent Robbery: A sustained attack on Welsh council housing and council tenants, Bevan Foundation
Links: Report
Date: 2010-Dec
An audit report in Wales said that 'little progress' had been made in improving the planning and delivery of housing services for people with mental health needs. Strategic planning remained of poor quality; and joint planning between local health, social care, and housing service providers was not always effective. The Assembly Government's monitoring of the delivery of its housing targets had also been ineffective.
Source: Housing Services for Adults with Mental Health Needs, Wales Audit Office
Links: Report | WAO press release | NHS Wales press release | BBC report | Public Finance report
Date: 2010-Nov
An independent study found that the savings to other services of the Supporting People Programme in Wales (providing housing-related support to vulnerable people) 'far outweighed' the cost of the scheme.
Source: Mansel Aylward, Kerry Bailey, Ceri Phillips, Keith Cox and Eleanor Higgins, The Supporting People Programme in Wales: Final Report, Welsh Assembly Government
Links: Report | Summary | WAG press release | NHS Wales press release
Date: 2010-Nov
A report examined the economic significance of employment in the housing-related support sector in Wales. Over 9, 500 full-time jobs were provided by the sector, with over £42 million added to the Welsh economy.
Source: Housing-Related Support in Wales: Understanding employment in the sector, Cymorth Cymru
Links: Report | Inside Housing report
Date: 2010-Oct
A report said that an estimated 284,000 additional homes were required in Wales between 2006 and 2026. 183,000 of these were in the market sector and 101,000 in the non-market sector. In addition, there was an existing backlog of unmet housing need that was estimated at 9,500 households.
Source: Housing Need and Demand in Wales 2006 to 2026, Welsh Assembly Government
Links: Report | Shelter Cymru press release
Date: 2010-Jul
The new Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition government dropped its opposition to a measure devolving certain housing powers to the Welsh Assembly Government. It said that it had received assurances that the powers would not be used to hinder the sale of social and council housing.
Source: Press release 29 June 2010, Wales Office
Links: Wales Office press release | Welsh Assembly Government press release | BBC report
Date: 2010-Jun
Proposals designed to give the National Assembly of Wales powers to legislate on housing for the first time failed to get the necessary Parliamentary approval before the United Kingdom general election.
Source: BBC report, 9 April 2010
Links: BBC report
Date: 2010-Apr
The Welsh Assembly Government published a strategy document that brought together separate strategies on meeting housing need, homelessness, and housing-related support services.
Source: Improving Lives and Communities: Homes in Wales, Welsh Assembly Government
Links: Strategy | Inside Housing report
Date: 2010-Apr
An article examined transport devolution to Wales in 2005-06. Although the legislative process was ultimately advantageous to effective policy devolution as perceived both by central and devolved government, it also highlighted the problems of dependency on United Kingdom legislative discretion.
Source: Jonathan Bradbury and Ian Stafford, 'The effectiveness of legislative mechanisms for the devolution of powers in the UK: the case of transport devolution to Wales', Public Money and Management, Volume 30 Issue 2
Links: Abstract
Date: 2010-Mar
The Welsh Assembly Government published (following consultation) the first five-year national transport plan for Wales.
Source: National Transport Plan, Welsh Assembly Government
Links: Plan | BBC report
Date: 2010-Mar
A report examined the implications for Wales of future energy shortages. Wales was worse-placed than any other part of the UK to absorb higher travel costs and/or climate taxation, especially those that affected private car use. The Welsh Assembly Government's aspiration to eliminate fuel poverty by 2018 was probably unattainable in a regime of increasing energy prices.
Source: Calvin Jones, Wales in the Energy Crunch, Welsh Economy Research Unit/Centre for Business Relationships, Accountability, Sustainability and Society
Links: Report
Date: 2010-Feb
A report examined housing-related support services in Wales. It said that high-quality services were crucial given the vulnerability of users; and, in many cases, support services made a real difference to the quality of service users' lives. Yet defining, measuring, and commissioning for 'quality' were less straightforward in this field than in others. This could make achieving high quality more challenging than in other service areas.
Source: Delivering Quality in Housing-Related Support: Views from the sector, Housemark Cymru
Links: Report
Date: 2010-Feb
A report by a committee of the National Assembly for Wales said that the Welsh Assembly Government should be able to legislate to suspend the 'right to buy' council housing stock in areas where there was a shortage of social housing.
Source: The National Assembly for Wales (Legislative Competence) (Housing and Local Government) Order 2010, Legislation Committee No 2/National Assembly for Wales
Links: Report | NAW press release | Inside Housing report
Date: 2010-Feb
A report by a committee of MPs endorsed plans to devolve wide-ranging legislative competence for social housing policy to the National Assembly for Wales.
Source: Proposed National Assembly for Wales (Legislative Competence) (Housing and Local Government) Order 2010, Relating to Sustainable Housing, Sixth Report (Session 2009-10), HC 186, House of Commons Welsh Affairs Select Committee/TSO
Links: Report
Date: 2010-Feb
