In its White Paper published in December 1994, the new Department of Housing encapsulated the housing problem through a number of critical statistics. The functional urbanisation rate was estimated at 66%. It was estimated in 1995 that 500 000 urban households lived in unacceptable living conditions. The housing backlog in the country was estimated to be 1,5 million units. Urban formal units housed 61% of the total number of households in the country (the construction of low-income formal units had decreased from 45 000 in the 1989/90 financial year to 20 000 in 1993/94), urban informal units accounted for 1,5 million units (including site-and-service sites that
needed upgrading), public and private hostels housed 5,2% of the households; 13,5% of the households were in informal housing; and approximately 58% of all households had secure tenure.
In addressing the defined “housing problem”, the new government essentially adopted the enablement approach. It set itself the task of increasing housing delivery by building one million houses in five years (1994 to 1999). The key strategies listed in the White Paper (Department of Housing, 1994:4-5) were:
Stabilise the housing environment;
Facilitate the establishment of institutional, technical and logistical housing support mechanisms to enable delivery to occur;
Mobilise private savings and housing credit;
Provide subsidy assistance to the poorest of the poor;
Rationalise institutional capacity in the housing sector within a sustainable, long-term institutional framework;
Facilitate speedy release and servicing of land; and
Coordinate and integrate public sector investment and interventions on a multi-functional basis.
The most important strategy adopted to achieve this task was the Housing Subsidy Scheme, which assisted low-income households to acquire ownership of fixed residential property. A number of features were inherent to this scheme. The level of the housing subsidy was linked to household income. Thus subsidies were set at R15 000 for households with a total income or R0-R1 500, R12 500 for households with a total income of R801-R1 500, R9 500 for households with a total income of R1 501-R2 500, and R5 000 for households with a total income of R2 501-R3 500.
The objective was to provide "suitable" accommodation for the urban poor, and there was seeming concurrence on what was suitable. Therefore, although the urban poor had different household structures, their houses were uniform and contained what was considered as the basic structures of a house. In addition, until very recently (2000) emphasis was only on home-ownership, with a total neglect of rental accommodation. This was particularly critical for younger households, especially those headed by women. Furthermore, the housing subsidy was inadequate to cover all the costs of a house that is regarded as "suitable" accommodation. Most of the other costs of the house (estimated at R3 for every R1 of the subsidy) had to be obtained from somewhere else (obviously from households). This was more so given the high
infrastructure standards set by local authorities.
Linked and parallel to the Housing Subsidy strategy, government also adopted what was known as the People's Housing Process, which essentially encouraged households to commit their own resources to housing, especially through savings and own labour. The critical success factors for the People's Housing Process were:
Access to land (urban and rural) with secure tenure and adequate services;
Access to housing subsidy;
Access to alternative forms of housing credit;
Access to housing information and consumer education; The mobilisation of savings; and
Opportunities for employment creation (Ministry of Housing, 1997:7).
Amongst constraints to the achievement of the housing strategy, the department highlighted affordability as the most significant. On the one hand there was the challenge of national fiscal affordability given the "size of the cake" and competing national priorities. On the other hand there were the low incomes amongst the target population. For example, it was estimated that approximately 49% of South African households had incomes of less than R1 000 a month. Given the scale of the housing problem and the accompanying constraints, the White Paper concludes that "(a) housing programme cannot be limited to housing, but needs to be promoted in such a manner as to give meaning to the goal of creating viable communities. This simple self evident statement will necessitate the most fundamental and far-reaching conceptual and behavioural change for those involved in the housing delivery process ..." (Department of Housing, 1994:11).
Of interest to this research is that there were no fundamental differences between the old and new government in their emphasis on supply, despite their different political objectives. For both of them the starting point was quantification and subsequent concern with what they defined as the backlog, and thus need. Spiegel et.al. (1996) note that even in the research dialogue the focus has continued to be largely on supply. As such very little has become known about the nature of demand for housing. A number of writers (for example Jenkins, 1999) analysing the current South African housing policy point to inadequacies of community participation mechanisms. Whilst there is recognition of the diversity of communities, and the housing policy seeks to address the diversity, there is limited analysis of the diversity of households within
these diverse communities.
The diversity of household structures and thus housing needs and ability to respond to opportunities and constraints presented by the policy have been overlooked. The history of the South African housing policy shows a clear relationship between the conceptualisation of the household and housing policy decisions. Who is defined as part of the household, who is a dependent, who is a breadwinner (gender division of labour) and so on all impact very directly on housing provision, the calculation of affordability, access to housing opportunities, and housing allocation systems. Indeed, if the different household structures and the different opportunities and constraints they provide are acknowledged, different housing systems will probably be in place, and more responsive to different needs.
I thus argue that household analysis should be a major contributor to South African housing policy. Research is needed to dissect the demand side of housing at the household level. Therefore, with the analysis of the Inanda Newtown site-and-service housing scheme, I add to this body of knowledge.
7.0 THE CASE STUDY OF INANDA NEWTOWN: A PRODUCT OF THE LATE