It is currently drawn by 4.7 million recipients, including 66 per cent of all council tenants. It is also paid to tenants of housing associations and to tenants of private landlords, but not to owner-occupiers. Dr King shows how attempts by successive governments to reduce expenditure on housing benefit have failed, owing to perverse incentives within the system. It allows landlords to raise rents without encountering objections from tenants, because they are not paying their rent or at least not all of it. In many cases tenants do not even see the money as it goes straight to the landlord.
Council tenants pay no rent or very little rent.
Landlords prefer to have benefit claimants as tenants, since they are guaranteed payment and can raise rents with impunity. Attempts by government to set a ceiling for housing benefit payments in each area have resulted in many landlords raising their rents to the highest level allowed. There is little connection between standard of accommodation and rent, nor between tenants' housing and their resources. There is nothing to stop tenants from 'trading up' and nothing to encourage them to 'trade down', as most or all of their rent will be paid for them, wherever they live. Dr King proposes a level playing field, with no special regard to age or tenure in assessing whether people need help with housing costs.