Empty council homes to be sold and brought back to life

New measures have been put in place to fight the housing shortage in London.

The Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, Eric Pickles, has urged town halls across the capital to list their property stocks by April 2015, in order to sell all those empty homes worth more than £1million.

The move would allow the councils to sell the expensive vacant buildings and therefore reinvest the money into new homes for hundreds of families who are currently on the waiting list for the social housing.

Details of the high-priced properties are expected to be published by postcode, in order to keep track of the value of the buildings in different parts of the city.

Mr Pickles has taken the chance to emphasize Southwark council’s empty homes initiative. Last October, in fact, the borough has sold one four-story building for £3million, in order to fund the construction of twenty new homes.

Good news come from the property experts, who have announced most of the inhabited social housing in the capital are worth over £1million and on top of that, hundreds of them are available.

While the Government is willing to seriously invest in social projects, independent charity Empty Homes has been working hard since 1992, to bring empty homes back into use.

Their 2013 report clearly shows the results of consistent campaigning activities during the previous year, when they obtained pledges to get 182 empty homes into use all over the UK.

UK needs more apprenticeships

Sir Michael Wilshaw, head of Ofsted and chief inspector of schools in England, has declared that UK employers should do more for young British people.

During the CBI Conference held yesterday in Cambridge, Sir Michael stressed that companies have the ‘moral imperative’ to train young nationals instead of employing skilled people from abroad.

There are currently 146,000 job vacancies in the UK which cannot be filled by British unemployed citizens, due to lack of skilled candidates.

This is why businesses should set up apprenticeships and engage with schools and colleges all over the UK, to tell students about vacancies.

The 2011 Census data recently released by the Office for National Statistics (ONS), show that 63 per cent of the 6 million foreign-born population aged 16 to 64 were in employment, only a slightly lower level than the UK-born population, 69 per cent.

Also, those arrived between 2007 and 2011 were more highly qualified than immigrants who had been in the UK for longer and therefore, were more likely to work in highly skilled posts.

The main problem, however, stays within the vocational education system which, according to the head of Ofsted, is nationally perceived as a second choice and does not hold the same esteem as a university qualification.

Apprenticeships, instead, should be seen as an alternative to A-levels and be promoted accordingly.

From this perspective, many job vacancies would be easily turned into apprenticeships, now that the economy is finally improving.

Schools, on the other side, are supposed to prioritise spending on their career service and bound to local businesses. At present, only one out of five British schools are offering career advisors, according to a recent Ofsted report.

“We are streets behind other European countries in our provision of vocational education.  Norway, Germany and Switzerland do it excellently. The curriculum of their vocational education courses are formulated by businesses and intake levels are dictated by market demand”, Sir Michael declared.

UK plans to curb immigration

Britain anti-immigrant sentiment is at its peak, both among the public and in the realm of politics.

PM David Cameron has recently highlighted his intention of restricting overall numbers of immigrants  from the EU countries and deport those unable to support themselves after three months.

During the last EU summit, however, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said that the EU principles, including the freedom of movement one, are not negotiable.

She tried to convince Mr Cameron not to put limits on the number of EU citizens allowed to work in Britain. That would be a point of no return toward the EU exit door.

Previous President of the European Commission Mr Barroso also warned that UK plans to curb immigration would undermine the equal status of EU citizens, during  a speech held in London when he was still in office.

However, immigration in Britain is not a so recent priority. The country's universally accessible health and welfare services have always attracted migrants from all walks of life. 

It does not have to happen at the expense of the Welfare State, though.

Data from the Centre for Research and Analysis of Migration (CReAM) revealed that immigrants contributed 34 per cent more in revenues than they received in state expenditures over the decade from 2001 to 2011.

Another study on immigrants from the 10 countries that joined the EU in 2004, highlighted that they contributed more to the UK than they took out in public services.

Still, data released from the Migration Observatory and Ipsos Mori and related to a set of surveys from the past decades, show that a steady majority of Britons think the immigration rate is too high, regardless of actual numbers. Also, cultural concerns are secondary to economic ones.

Last week  a senior cabinet minister has claimed some towns in the UK are being swamped by immigrants. Downing Street intervened later, claiming Mr Fallon had chosen the wrong words.