HAVING lived in the far south-west of Cornwall for 50 years, I have first-hand experience of the insecure housing situation that the working-class community here has always struggled with. 

This is mainly the result very low wages, insufficient social housing, and very short-term winter-let contracts in the private housing sector; which allow private landlords and agents to cash in on premium rents from tourists during the summer season.

The situation has always been bad. But shortly after the Covid lockdown began in early 2020, the ensuing avalanche of wealthy people fleeing urban environments for spacious, rural idylls took everyone by surprise. 

But what shocked most and hit the hardest, was not so much the rocketing cost of house-purchasing, it was the cost of private rental properties that local people depend heavily on for their housing needs, which suddenly went through the roof.

Wealthy individuals seeking a temporary escape from city life during the lockdown were proactively offering three to four times the normal rent, and were willing to pay upfront deposits of at least a year in advance. No locals could come close to competing. 

Properties being bought, often by cash buyers at inflated prices meant that by December 2021 — less than a year since the start of lockdown — some areas of Cornwall had up to 40 per cent of its housing stock used as second homes and so no longer available for long-term rent. 

In April this year the number of second homes throughout Cornwall was estimated to be almost 13,000 with holiday lets numbering more than 11,000 (while translating these figures into an accurate percentage is not possible owing complicated variables, a ballpark estimate would likely be in the region of 13 per cent, which would be twice as high as the percentage in Wales, which has also experienced this problem).

Evictions in the poorly regulated private rental market dramatically escalated as letting agents evicted long-term, local tenants under the notorious Section 21 “no-fault eviction notice” of the 1988 Housing Act, and cashed in on the new influx of elite city escapees by selling and renting to them at exorbitant prices. 

Evictions were temporarily halted under Covid restrictions but bailiffs are now working flat out to catch up! And this trend has not subsided. 

In the last year there has been a 50 per cent rise in repossession of rented homes (Ministry of Justice figures) and a further 120 repossession claims are pending, which should they be successful will increase the rise in evictions to a staggering 169 per cent over a 12-month period. 

And these figures predate the recent surge in interest rates which will further exacerbate the problem.

Cornwall Council, a unitary authority (Lib Dem and Independent coalition until May 2021, now Tory-controlled), has been extremely slow to act, and continues to show little sign of genuine urgency. 

About a year into the Covid pandemic in 2021, Cornwall Council began installing one-bed Portacabin-style shelters in some council-owned carparks in order to try to alleviate the escalating epidemic of street homelessness. 

Families were, and continue to be, accommodated in budget hotels or B&Bs, often many hundreds of miles outside Cornwall in regions where they have no family, friends or support networks. 

It is a starkly grim situation. In June this year Cornwall had more than 10,000 Airbnb listings, while fewer than 70 properties were available for domestic rentals, and in several Cornish towns — Newquay, Penzance, St Ives, Perranporth, Bude, Fowey and Looe — the number of available domestic rentals was zero. 

The number of people waiting for housing on the council’s Housing Homechoice register leapt from 9,000 in March 2020 to almost 22,000 in April this year. Cornwall Housing estimates it manages a social housing stock of only about 10,400 homes. The shortfall in social housing is glaring.

A government white paper was introduced in the last Queen’s Speech which includes the intention to abolish the notorious Section 21 no-fault eviction notices for tenants. 

However, there is already some talk by the government of scrapping the abolition. But even if it survives, in its place is the right for landlords to seek evictions if they wish to sell the property — which pretty much amounts to a slightly watered-down version of Section 21, and still leaves tenants with no long-term security of tenure. And with the government currently imploding the likelihood of any Bill making it through to legislation any time soon is a fantasy.

Despite all this, luxury properties with starting prices of around £1 million, continue to spring up along Cornwall’s beautiful coastline and in picturesque villages. 

Areas listed as Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB) seem to count for nothing, and planning regs it seems cannot, or will not, control this juggernaut of inappropriate newbuilds. 

Wales (my birth country and childhood home), however, is doing somewhat better. Having experienced almost identical problems to Cornwall, the Welsh government in collaboration with Plaid Cymru, has introduced quite a radical programme of actions. 

Planning regs will have three new categories: primary home; second home; holiday let. 

Local authority planners will have powers to impose restrictions on numbers of properties in each category, and planning permission will be required for a change of use/category. 

A mandatory licencing scheme is being introduced for all holiday accommodation alongside increased land taxation for second homes and holiday lets. Local authorities in Wales have already been given powers to increase council tax on second and empty homes. 

These measures by the Welsh government ought to act as a blue print for the Westminster government, but the Westminster government’s white paper — entitled Renters Reform Bill — is lamentably weak and extremely limited in ambition, and has been in the process-pipeline since 2019, so no apparent sense of urgency.

There are pockets of resistance starting to stir in Cornwall; a region which does not have a strong history of militancy. The Acorn Community Union has been very active in the Falmouth and surrounding area legally challenging bad landlords and letting agencies, and physically supporting tenants to refuse entry to bailiffs. 

Organisations such as First Not Second Homes and Stop the Destruction of Cornwall have taken to the streets in protest, and frequently lobby the local authority. 

But despite the burgeoning fightback, the situation continues to deteriorate, and with a cold and austere winter approaching, maintaining a sense of optimism and fighting spirit is becoming ever more difficult for activists, yet the determination to continue the struggle and demand action from both the local authority and the Westminster government to transform the situation for Cornwall’s workers, tenants, would-be home owners and the growing number of homeless people, continues unabated. 

It has to, there is no other option. Cornwall is being systematically emptied out of its local working-class population.