Glasgow University to lead research into the housing crisis
Courtesy: Telegraph.co.uk
Professor Ken Gibb of the University of Glasgow is to lead a team of nine universities in research to provide robust evidence informing housing policy and practice across the UK. He is currently Director of Policy Scotland at the University of Glasgow but will be Principal Investigator and Director of the newly created UK Collaborative Centre for Housing Evidence.
Research work will start in August taking five years to complete with £6 million funding from the Economic and Social Research Council with support from the Joseph Rowntree Foundation and the Arts and Humanities Research Council. £1,5 million will come from the consortium itself and the five hubs will include Sheffield, London, Cardiff and Belfast universities.
The AHRC reports that 'The availability, cost and design of housing impacts on people's aspirations, their health and wellbeing and even their children's education. Failure of housing markets can lead to wider economic problems, as well as poverty and homelessness'.
Professor Gibb says 'The serious and complex problems of the housing system are too important to ignore. This is why I am looking forward to this new initiative making a serious contribution to tackling one of the most pressing policy problems in the UK'.
The Centre and its work will join together a comprehensive range of stakeholders with the goal of tackling housing problems at a national, devolved, regional and local level.