A catchy and popular slogan, but what does it mean? Most commonly, especially for those who use it politically, the implication is that it is the right of every citizen and the duty of every government, to provide everyone with a house.
Indeed, when it is incorporated into policy, governments start to think about providing everyone with a house.... but realising the impossibility of the task, starts to ‘prioritise’, starting from those in the middle perhaps because it realises that the poor are too numerous and that the houses cannot be ‘free.’
In practice, regardless of the narrowness of the definition, no government manages to meet its target and the programme is eventually abandoned, often with no “houses” having been provided. Another alternative is to provide access to housing finance, usually by subsidising or “liberalising” loans. In Pakistan, where only some 5% houses are built with loans, such schemes are unlikely to meet much of the need.
So, is ‘Housing for All’ possible? Yes, if we say “houses for the establishment, or judges or senior civil servants” - in other words, those who could any way afford housing and who may also be recipients of free or highly subsidised plots for housing. But what can be done about the rest?
In Pakistan close on 90% of households say that they own their houses or get them “rent-free” as part of their occupation or relationship, for example with their employer or family. On the other hand, more than half of all housing is inadequate in terms of construction and/or services or illegal in terms of land and/or location.
Housing for All should require every local authority, municipality, or district administration to have a plan showing where Housing for All will be located. Even a simple rule-of-thumb population projection will suffice to give the projected population increase over the next decade. Such a plan may not result in overcoming the housing shortage, but it is a prerequisite for planning.
The plan should demarcate land that is required for other commercial and strategic purposes, including environmental protection, logistics or other purposes, and will NOT be allowed for housing. Secondly, there should be a plan for increasing the water supply and treatment facilities commensurate with the expected population. There will be short-term losers and gainers amongst landowners, but this will even out. The authority should not be involved in the layout or planning of ‘housing schemes’: that should be left to landowners and developers. The authorities should help reduce the total land required by limiting the size of residential plots and increasing the height of permitted development.
Water, sewerage, electricity, street cleaning and land use should be the responsibility of the local authority. If nothing else, this will prevent domestic users from having to pay price increases caused by circular debt.
Houses and Lifestyles
The definition and understanding of the meaning and purpose of “House” also needs some clarification and better understanding. Some 30% of housing (or half of the housing deficit) is because there is only one room, and thus the house is considered over-crowded. This is true of rural as well as urban housing, especially in the case of housing in katchi abadis. While the urban house may not have more rooms because of cost, or the lack of land, this is not sufficient to explain why so much of rural housing has only one room, especially when most one-roomed houses are built of earth or other locally collected materials and built without paid labour. So, neither cost not scarcity is the answer so much as social custom and usage.
Housing, for the majority of the population, even in Europe, was a one-roomed structure, except for the upper income, landed gentry. With few possessions, the single room sufficed for the storage of the few items that most households had, and was the living, eating, and sleeping space as well. This began to change with the Industrial Revolution, that not only brought people to cities but also allowed the proliferation of household goods.
Until about 150 years ago, there was no segregation or separation of rooms by function, furnishing or equipment. The gradual export of products such as furniture accompanied the imported fashion of separating bedrooms from living rooms and eventually, the dining room. The kitchen, for the most part, like the toilet, remained outside and often separated from the rest of the house. In many societies, multiple rooms were used to accommodate the families of brothers or of other relatives in a single compound.
Furthermore, in climates that are not extreme, much of the living, and especially sleeping, takes place outdoors, often in a courtyard or under trees, and the house (or room) is only used for storage. There are no separate rooms for activities such as changing clothes. Visitors would also be entertained outside rather than in a drawing or sitting room. In other places and cultures, the roof, or kotha is considered the ideal living space since it is cleaner and cooler, especially if it has a brick or earthen floor that can be sprinkled with water for evaporative cooling.
All in all, therefore, having a single roomed house is neither an indication of poverty, or being incomplete, nor a sign of deprivation.
A house, on the other hand has a much greater significance than being merely a place to live and keep one's possessions. A house defines one's place in society. It is likely that there will be a similarity amongst neighbouring houses in terms of their occupants, and in terms of its size and design. The neighbourhood or mohalla will help define and indeed be defined by the houses it is made up of. Whereas in the USA, the average family moves house every 5 years or so, in societies like Pakistan, it might be 5 generations or more having lived in the same house.
It is traditional when meeting someone from your city to ask which mohalla they are from. That will indicate not only the person’s, income, ethnicity, religious background but also their daily life and routine, where they went to school and indeed their circle of friends.
In that sort of relationship with houses and neighbourhoods, it can be disastrous if children have to move far when they want to set up their own house and household. Ideally, they should stay on in the same house, perhaps with extensions and subdivisions to create additional space. Conversely, having “strangers” moving in or living on the floor above you is far more disturbing that in a more mobile society. Thus, having “slow rise” urban development by accretion is far better than the ever-expanding addition of developments of new housing on the outskirts.
In similar fashion, when a new house is built in an informal area, the owners often have no final or end design in mind, nor will they necessarily know when the house will be finished – since the final form depends on the fortunes of the household, and indeed of the town and area they are located in. The insistence of urban authorities to not allow or consider a house finished before they will allow it to be occupied, deprives households from having a more interactive relationship with their living space. It certainly doesn’t allow the house to better reflect their changing fortune. Households thus have to spend more on their initial house than they can afford and would probably be forced to relocate to reflect their improved circumstance, thus losing contact with their neighbourhood and their neighbours.
Counting Houses
The basis of any policy or intervention to improve the quality or quantity of houses needs to start off by an understanding of what exists and what the need is. In this, the generally accepted instrument is the census. In Pakistan, the census is not just the basis of policy but the basis of politics, not least it determines the shares and contributions of the Centre and of each of the Provinces. However, for the purposes of housing policy, there are a number of shortcomings, starting with the definition itself. A house is a structure occupied by a household. While there is nothing wrong with that, it means that any structure NOT occupied by a household is not counted. So, we have no idea how many houses there are. More importantly, we also do not know how many households there are simply because they have no houses, because they cannot afford one. Nor do we know, for example, how many housing plots are lying vacant.
Similarly, we do not know the condition/quality of houses. We assume that if a house is built out of earth, it must be inferior to one built out of fired bricks, when that is not necessarily the case, especially in rural areas. We also do not know, for example, how many houses have solar panels and generate their own electricity because those that have both are not counted, only those that have solar panels and no electricity connection. Having a piped water connection is counted, whether or not there is any water supplied by it. Rooms are counted, verandas and courtyards, where much of the living takes place are similarly not counted.
We constantly bemoan the fact that Pakistan’s housing sector is in dire straits and that there is a shortage of millions of units. Yet, the number of homeless, hasn’t increased, not can we be certain that the overall quality of housing has deteriorated. According to the Census, the number of housing units added at each count is more or less commensurate with the number of households added, as indeed it must!
Housing For All
If we are serious about housing for all, we have to look beyond houses and develop a more inclusive, holistic approach. So what can be done:
Indeed, when it is incorporated into policy, governments start to think about providing everyone with a house.... but realising the impossibility of the task, starts to ‘prioritise’, starting from those in the middle perhaps because it realises that the poor are too numerous and that the houses cannot be ‘free.’
In practice, regardless of the narrowness of the definition, no government manages to meet its target and the programme is eventually abandoned, often with no “houses” having been provided. Another alternative is to provide access to housing finance, usually by subsidising or “liberalising” loans. In Pakistan, where only some 5% houses are built with loans, such schemes are unlikely to meet much of the need.
So, is ‘Housing for All’ possible? Yes, if we say “houses for the establishment, or judges or senior civil servants” - in other words, those who could any way afford housing and who may also be recipients of free or highly subsidised plots for housing. But what can be done about the rest?
In Pakistan close on 90% of households say that they own their houses or get them “rent-free” as part of their occupation or relationship, for example with their employer or family. On the other hand, more than half of all housing is inadequate in terms of construction and/or services or illegal in terms of land and/or location.
Housing for All should require every local authority, municipality, or district administration to have a plan showing where Housing for All will be located. Even a simple rule-of-thumb population projection will suffice to give the projected population increase over the next decade. Such a plan may not result in overcoming the housing shortage, but it is a prerequisite for planning.
The plan should demarcate land that is required for other commercial and strategic purposes, including environmental protection, logistics or other purposes, and will NOT be allowed for housing. Secondly, there should be a plan for increasing the water supply and treatment facilities commensurate with the expected population. There will be short-term losers and gainers amongst landowners, but this will even out. The authority should not be involved in the layout or planning of ‘housing schemes’: that should be left to landowners and developers. The authorities should help reduce the total land required by limiting the size of residential plots and increasing the height of permitted development.
Water, sewerage, electricity, street cleaning and land use should be the responsibility of the local authority. If nothing else, this will prevent domestic users from having to pay price increases caused by circular debt.
Houses and Lifestyles
The definition and understanding of the meaning and purpose of “House” also needs some clarification and better understanding. Some 30% of housing (or half of the housing deficit) is because there is only one room, and thus the house is considered over-crowded. This is true of rural as well as urban housing, especially in the case of housing in katchi abadis. While the urban house may not have more rooms because of cost, or the lack of land, this is not sufficient to explain why so much of rural housing has only one room, especially when most one-roomed houses are built of earth or other locally collected materials and built without paid labour. So, neither cost not scarcity is the answer so much as social custom and usage.
Housing, for the majority of the population, even in Europe, was a one-roomed structure, except for the upper income, landed gentry. With few possessions, the single room sufficed for the storage of the few items that most households had, and was the living, eating, and sleeping space as well. This began to change with the Industrial Revolution, that not only brought people to cities but also allowed the proliferation of household goods.
Until about 150 years ago, there was no segregation or separation of rooms by function, furnishing or equipment. The gradual export of products such as furniture accompanied the imported fashion of separating bedrooms from living rooms and eventually, the dining room. The kitchen, for the most part, like the toilet, remained outside and often separated from the rest of the house. In many societies, multiple rooms were used to accommodate the families of brothers or of other relatives in a single compound.
Furthermore, in climates that are not extreme, much of the living, and especially sleeping, takes place outdoors, often in a courtyard or under trees, and the house (or room) is only used for storage. There are no separate rooms for activities such as changing clothes. Visitors would also be entertained outside rather than in a drawing or sitting room. In other places and cultures, the roof, or kotha is considered the ideal living space since it is cleaner and cooler, especially if it has a brick or earthen floor that can be sprinkled with water for evaporative cooling.
All in all, therefore, having a single roomed house is neither an indication of poverty, or being incomplete, nor a sign of deprivation.
A house, on the other hand has a much greater significance than being merely a place to live and keep one's possessions. A house defines one's place in society. It is likely that there will be a similarity amongst neighbouring houses in terms of their occupants, and in terms of its size and design. The neighbourhood or mohalla will help define and indeed be defined by the houses it is made up of. Whereas in the USA, the average family moves house every 5 years or so, in societies like Pakistan, it might be 5 generations or more having lived in the same house.
It is traditional when meeting someone from your city to ask which mohalla they are from. That will indicate not only the person’s, income, ethnicity, religious background but also their daily life and routine, where they went to school and indeed their circle of friends.
In that sort of relationship with houses and neighbourhoods, it can be disastrous if children have to move far when they want to set up their own house and household. Ideally, they should stay on in the same house, perhaps with extensions and subdivisions to create additional space. Conversely, having “strangers” moving in or living on the floor above you is far more disturbing that in a more mobile society. Thus, having “slow rise” urban development by accretion is far better than the ever-expanding addition of developments of new housing on the outskirts.
In similar fashion, when a new house is built in an informal area, the owners often have no final or end design in mind, nor will they necessarily know when the house will be finished – since the final form depends on the fortunes of the household, and indeed of the town and area they are located in. The insistence of urban authorities to not allow or consider a house finished before they will allow it to be occupied, deprives households from having a more interactive relationship with their living space. It certainly doesn’t allow the house to better reflect their changing fortune. Households thus have to spend more on their initial house than they can afford and would probably be forced to relocate to reflect their improved circumstance, thus losing contact with their neighbourhood and their neighbours.
Counting Houses
The basis of any policy or intervention to improve the quality or quantity of houses needs to start off by an understanding of what exists and what the need is. In this, the generally accepted instrument is the census. In Pakistan, the census is not just the basis of policy but the basis of politics, not least it determines the shares and contributions of the Centre and of each of the Provinces. However, for the purposes of housing policy, there are a number of shortcomings, starting with the definition itself. A house is a structure occupied by a household. While there is nothing wrong with that, it means that any structure NOT occupied by a household is not counted. So, we have no idea how many houses there are. More importantly, we also do not know how many households there are simply because they have no houses, because they cannot afford one. Nor do we know, for example, how many housing plots are lying vacant.
Similarly, we do not know the condition/quality of houses. We assume that if a house is built out of earth, it must be inferior to one built out of fired bricks, when that is not necessarily the case, especially in rural areas. We also do not know, for example, how many houses have solar panels and generate their own electricity because those that have both are not counted, only those that have solar panels and no electricity connection. Having a piped water connection is counted, whether or not there is any water supplied by it. Rooms are counted, verandas and courtyards, where much of the living takes place are similarly not counted.
We constantly bemoan the fact that Pakistan’s housing sector is in dire straits and that there is a shortage of millions of units. Yet, the number of homeless, hasn’t increased, not can we be certain that the overall quality of housing has deteriorated. According to the Census, the number of housing units added at each count is more or less commensurate with the number of households added, as indeed it must!
Housing For All
If we are serious about housing for all, we have to look beyond houses and develop a more inclusive, holistic approach. So what can be done:
- Planning and provision of land for housing that avoids environmental and other hazards
- Provision for 4 storey housing as the norm, upgrading and adding necessary infrastructure
- Locally managed infrastructure
- Acceptance and incorporation of local and traditional building materials and techniques
- Housing facilitators instead of building inspectors
- Provision for small, sequential loans for adding, extending and upgrading houses
- Provision for street trading, mohalla workshops and manufacturing units
- Formal provision for education, health and other community services in housing areas
- Increase in rental and short-term housing, especially for in-migrant
- Facilitate provision of non-agricultural employment and income-generation in rural areas