Why should the council house ex-RAF man? (From Bucks Free Press)

Why should the council house ex-RAF man?

12:00pm Friday 3rd August 2012 in Your Letters

RE: Last week’s story on the RAF serviceman who fears he will be homeless when leaving the force, as Wycombe District Council is doing ‘little or nothing’ to find him a house .

MUCH though I feel a little sorry for Kevin Taylor the RAF serviceman and his family, I can't but help compare it with my time in the Royal Navy. Having met my now wife, living in Bucks and earning £5,000 a year, compared to my £8,000, we saved and got a mortgage for a £35,950 one-bedroom flat in Holmer Green. I was Portsmouth-based and as such a weekend husband.

Eventually we moved to a three-bedroom house in Micklefield and with the arrival of two children stayed there for 15 years.

I was stationed in Scotland, Portsmouth, Plymouth, Colchester and Northwood and went wherever the ships went on a ratio of 18 months shore based to 36 months sea. My trade was made obsolete in 1996 and to retrain I needed three years left to serve, not the two years 51 weeks I had, therefore negating any promotion or chance of extended service.

On the 18th July, 1999 I cut up my ID card and became Mr, and on my 40th birthday started work as a very confused civvy.

However quite why the council should pick up the tab to house you mystifies me, the lump sum you can take from your pension should pay for the rent of your privately rented accommodation, and there are four of you of work age to fund that rent.

That you didn’t have the foresight to buy a house when you started your career is understandable, but seriously just once in 30 years didn’t it cross your mind? Didn’t you question the 360 pay days you had and wonder where the money should be best spent? You have a pension, and means testing or whatever it’s now called that will put you well out of the range of those who need council housing.

Tim Jinks ex-Royal Navy 1975-99, Roman Way, Bourne End