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| Squatters and students caught in the squeeze | Squatters and students caught in the squeeze |
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| The older I get the more I realise that whenever society corrects one injustice it risks creating another by what it does. Two classic examples leap out of successive pages of the Guardian on Friday, one the new law to criminalise squatting, the next the fallout from the Home Office's decision to remove London Metropolitan University's licence to recruit and teach students from outside the EU. | The older I get the more I realise that whenever society corrects one injustice it risks creating another by what it does. Two classic examples leap out of successive pages of the Guardian on Friday, one the new law to criminalise squatting, the next the fallout from the Home Office's decision to remove London Metropolitan University's licence to recruit and teach students from outside the EU. |
| Were those actions correcting injustices – or merely the vindictive responses of a Tory-dominated coalition to the kind of people it doesn't like, squatters and foreign students? There may be a touch of the latter in the calculation, hopes of easy applause lines at the coming Conservative conference. But the same could be said in reverse about a Labour government being a soft touch to abuses such as squatting and – especially – student visa fraud. | Were those actions correcting injustices – or merely the vindictive responses of a Tory-dominated coalition to the kind of people it doesn't like, squatters and foreign students? There may be a touch of the latter in the calculation, hopes of easy applause lines at the coming Conservative conference. But the same could be said in reverse about a Labour government being a soft touch to abuses such as squatting and – especially – student visa fraud. |
| We all know cases, admittedly the minority, where squatters have occupied people's homes when they've been on holiday, had the builders in or were renting it out while living somewhere else. The Daily Mail doesn't make up these stories, though it loves to print them. Councils and housing associations have been plagued with squatting problems for decades. | We all know cases, admittedly the minority, where squatters have occupied people's homes when they've been on holiday, had the builders in or were renting it out while living somewhere else. The Daily Mail doesn't make up these stories, though it loves to print them. Councils and housing associations have been plagued with squatting problems for decades. |
| It's just a lazy cliche to claim that all squats are in houses that have been empty for years or belong to rich foreigners who deserve to get their place trashed. Needy families have been deprived of a home because squatters have derailed building plans and gobbled building funds in court fees. | It's just a lazy cliche to claim that all squats are in houses that have been empty for years or belong to rich foreigners who deserve to get their place trashed. Needy families have been deprived of a home because squatters have derailed building plans and gobbled building funds in court fees. |
| But, as with the clampdown on London Met's poor visa management, a lot of innocents get hurt in the squeeze. As Owen Bowcott reports from a squat on Friday – it's here – the civil law against squatting, often painfully slow and open to manipulation, that is being reinforced from midnight by criminal sanctions in England and Wales: up to six months in jail and a fine of up to £5,000. | But, as with the clampdown on London Met's poor visa management, a lot of innocents get hurt in the squeeze. As Owen Bowcott reports from a squat on Friday – it's here – the civil law against squatting, often painfully slow and open to manipulation, that is being reinforced from midnight by criminal sanctions in England and Wales: up to six months in jail and a fine of up to £5,000. |
| Right on cue, up pops David Cameron's ambitious housing minister, Grant Shapps, who may be making an elementary mistake by his high-profile tactics ahead of the government reshuffle, to say the law is "shifting the scales back in favour of the homeowner", a line from his draft party conference speech, I expect. | Right on cue, up pops David Cameron's ambitious housing minister, Grant Shapps, who may be making an elementary mistake by his high-profile tactics ahead of the government reshuffle, to say the law is "shifting the scales back in favour of the homeowner", a line from his draft party conference speech, I expect. |
| He's right, but he may also be shifting them there scales back in favour of property spivs, useless councils and housing associations, and others for whom housing is merely a tradeable commodity, not a social necessity, the unemployed or casually employed, the recently divorced or mentally ill for whom a squat may be a temporary lifeline. | He's right, but he may also be shifting them there scales back in favour of property spivs, useless councils and housing associations, and others for whom housing is merely a tradeable commodity, not a social necessity, the unemployed or casually employed, the recently divorced or mentally ill for whom a squat may be a temporary lifeline. |
| One such example surfaced on Radio 4's Today, the same "Katie" whom Owen Bowcott interviewed. Though a criminal conviction would damage her career (she's a supply teacher doing an Open University course and voluntary work to improve her CV), she's ended up in a squat after leaving an abusive relationship. That experience may have given her the articulate skills to stand up to Today's John Humphrys better than many a minister. | One such example surfaced on Radio 4's Today, the same "Katie" whom Owen Bowcott interviewed. Though a criminal conviction would damage her career (she's a supply teacher doing an Open University course and voluntary work to improve her CV), she's ended up in a squat after leaving an abusive relationship. That experience may have given her the articulate skills to stand up to Today's John Humphrys better than many a minister. |
| No, she insisted, squatting isn't denying an owner the right to use their property in the way that car theft is, because the owner can use the civil courts to get it back when they want it. Her squat is in a house that has been left empty for years, has no water or electricity and leaking roofs. "The crime is surely leaving houses empty when there is a shortage." | No, she insisted, squatting isn't denying an owner the right to use their property in the way that car theft is, because the owner can use the civil courts to get it back when they want it. Her squat is in a house that has been left empty for years, has no water or electricity and leaking roofs. "The crime is surely leaving houses empty when there is a shortage." |
| Even the chap from the property lobby was hard-pressed to get cross with her. As Bowcott's interviewees explain, the law is badly drafted and most squats are in empty buildings, occupied by people who are not making a political point, but just want somewhere to live in an era of rising rents. As licensed squats remind us all, they sometimes serve a useful purpose just by being there. | Even the chap from the property lobby was hard-pressed to get cross with her. As Bowcott's interviewees explain, the law is badly drafted and most squats are in empty buildings, occupied by people who are not making a political point, but just want somewhere to live in an era of rising rents. As licensed squats remind us all, they sometimes serve a useful purpose just by being there. |
| Is evicting squatters live on 24/7 TV, some of whom will have political motives, and using up valuable police time in the process, really what ministers want? Plenty of viewers who know more about rising housing costs than the average minister will sympathise with the squatters – especially those as articulate and reasonable as Katie. It's divisive, the opposite of the August Olympics, and ministers are currently not very popular. | Is evicting squatters live on 24/7 TV, some of whom will have political motives, and using up valuable police time in the process, really what ministers want? Plenty of viewers who know more about rising housing costs than the average minister will sympathise with the squatters – especially those as articulate and reasonable as Katie. It's divisive, the opposite of the August Olympics, and ministers are currently not very popular. |
| What the housing policy shares with the student visa problem is that both mix a traditional social good – a decent roof over one's head, the chance of a good education as the path to a better future – with the commoditisation of both, property as a source of speculation, student visas as a lucrative instrument of illegal immigration for economic, not educational, purposes. | What the housing policy shares with the student visa problem is that both mix a traditional social good – a decent roof over one's head, the chance of a good education as the path to a better future – with the commoditisation of both, property as a source of speculation, student visas as a lucrative instrument of illegal immigration for economic, not educational, purposes. |
| The fact that universities face pressure in an era of cuts to raise their sources of income, not least from foreign students who pay more, only serves to underline how the state gets drawn into – or actively encourages – such commoditisation. | The fact that universities face pressure in an era of cuts to raise their sources of income, not least from foreign students who pay more, only serves to underline how the state gets drawn into – or actively encourages – such commoditisation. |
| It would be naive to deny that such tensions have always existed in some form or another. Asylum laws are sometimes abused, just as human rights laws designed to protect the innocent are sometimes abused by the very guilty – often with the help of rights-waving lawyers. End one abuse and the chances are that the new protection will be abused by the unscrupulous. That's life. | It would be naive to deny that such tensions have always existed in some form or another. Asylum laws are sometimes abused, just as human rights laws designed to protect the innocent are sometimes abused by the very guilty – often with the help of rights-waving lawyers. End one abuse and the chances are that the new protection will be abused by the unscrupulous. That's life. |
| I have no idea how chaotic London Met's visa procedures were. I know that ministers have closed down private colleges for bogus activity and note that the man from a private company in Delhi specialising in finding students university places in the UK, whom Helen Pidd interviewed for the Guardian, acknowledged that, while his firm were only interested in genuine scholars: "We divide the market into two categories – the university market for genuine students and the immigration market." | |
| I can't condemn the government for trying to cut down on illegal immigration at a time of rising unemployment and public spending cuts when – so a small article in the Friday Guardian notes – net immigration is still running in excess of 216,000 a year. But 2,700 London Met students, most of them legitimate in their search for a degree, are now anxiously scrambling to find other places as a result. | |