Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: http://hdl.handle.net/1959.3/152298

Title

Worlds apart? Lower-income households and private renting in Australia and the UK

Author(s)

Hulse, Kath;  Pawson, Hal

Abstract

The private rental sectors (PRS) in Australia and the UK differ substantially in terms of size and composition, institutional settings, and historical role in their respective housing systems. However, governments in both countries envisage the PRS as playing an enhanced role in accommodating lower-income households, in part to offset declining opportunities to access social housing. In examining this development we ask how far contemporary housing policy objectives can be met within current institutional settings for the PRS. We examine the sector's role within the broader rental housing market and the institutional settings for the PRS in the two countries, which affect outcomes for lower income private tenants. The paper argues that achieving policy objectives to house lower-income households in the PRS, as well as in social housing, will require attention to the institutional settings for the PRS in addition to the acknowledged need to nurture supply. We examine prospects for better coordination between housing and related public policies and regulation of the PRS, and for a move to a more integrated rental market.

Publication type

Journal article

Research centre

Swinburne University of Technology. Faculty of Life and Social Sciences. Institute for Social Research

Source

International Journal of Housing Policy, Vol. 10, no. 4 (Dec 2010), pp. 399-419

Publication year

2010

FOR Code(s)

1205 Urban and Regional Planning;  1605 Policy and Administration

Keyword(s)

Australia;  Institutional settings;  Lower income;  Private rental;  Rental sector

Publisher

Routledge

ISSN

1461-6718

Publisher URL

http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14616718.2010.526403

Copyright

Copyright © 2010 Taylor & Francis.

Peer reviewed