Dispossession focuses on the neglect, demolition and regeneration of council estates across the UK and investigates how the state works with the private sector to demolish council estates to build on the land they stand on, making properties that are unaffordable to the majority of people.
While Thatcher’s Right To Buy lit the torch paper for the crisis, subsequent governmental schemes have further sunk Britain’s current and potential homeowners into the quagmire. These policies have prevented local councils and housing associations from building homes for the 1.4 million people on council housing waiting lists, and the amount of homelessness has risen to an estimated quarter of a million.
Dispossession is the story of people fighting for their communities, of people who know the difference between a house and a home, and who believe that housing is a human right, not an expensive luxury.
Directed by Paul Sng (Sleaford Mods – Invisible Britain) and narrated by Maxine Peake, the film explores the catastrophic failures that have led to a chronic shortage of social housing in Britain.
“Dispossession:The Great Housing Swindle is perhaps the most important British film since Ken Loach’s I, Daniel Blake” – The Big Issue
