by Will Stone

A GRENFELL law should be introduced to enshrine the right for decent housing for every citizen in Britain, Andy Burnham said today.

The Greater Manchester mayor told Glastonbury festival’s Left Field stage that properly regulating house building to a good and safe standard would help address the housing crisis.

He said: “We need a new housing-first strategy, because you can’t have anything without a good home.

“It should be a human right for everyone to have a decent, secure home and that’s what we should be working towards.

“But there’s a lot more social homes being sold than built and we can’t solve the housing crisis by ownership.

“Proper investment in decent, social housing would save millions of pounds of public money which would not be needed to rehome and tackle homelessness.

“It would be the best investment this country could make.”

Housing activist Kwajo Twenebo, who also spoke at the How To End The Housing Crisis debate, warned that things are becoming “so much worse” for young people.

“There are 145,000 homeless children across the country and it’s about time we started talking about it,” he said.

“So many people are living in slum conditions. We need to start seeing housing as a necessity and human right, not a statement of wealth.”

Jess Turtle, co-founder of the Museum of Homelessness, warned the country was seeing a “homeless emergency.”

She said: “We lost too many homes through right to buy and they’re not being replaced.

“Yet there are 200,000 long-term empty homes amid an acute housing crisis.”