boarded houses“Hell on Earth”. That was the how my hairdresser described life for many people and her take on faith, as we were discussing spiritual matters a while ago. And hearing something of her story, I can understand why she viewed it that way.

That conversation came back to me earlier this week, as I was listening to a radio phone-in program. The discussion had been sparked by a statement by Margaret Hodge, a government minister, who said that in the current shortage of houses, British families should be given priority over economic migrants. What interested me wasn’t the rights or wrongs of Ms. Hodge’s statement (which has been met by a fair amount of scorn), but over a statement made by one of the “experts” on the program.

The conversation was tracking along the need for more housing and the rapidly increasing number of households. In that context, the “expert” said that the percentage of single occupancy homes had increased from 17% to 30% in the last few years (I didn’t catch the time frame, so struck was I by the huge increase!).

Having dug around, looking for some statistics (I couldn’t find any statistics for Scotland, but here’s some for England) I have found some fascinating projections for the number of households over the next 20 years:

  • Extra number of houses needed = 5 million (from 21 to 26 million)
  • Current percentage of one person households = 30%
  • Projected percentage of one person household in 2026 = 40%
  • In 2026, the number of single person household will be larger than all other types of households (eg. married couples, single parents, co-habiting couples, other multi-person households).
  • Single person households increase by far the biggest amount (both numerical and percentage) over the next 20 years, with only the number of households with married couples decreasing.

Part of this increase is longer life expectancy, meaning that an increasing number of people are living beyond their partners. So a third of these one person households will be over the age of 65 years. But, it seems to me, that part of this increase is the breakdown of relationships & families, and the inability of people to live together. The largest increase in one person households are between 55-64 years old … just when the children leave home, and families can break up.

the great divorceI am sure it is more nuanced than I have portrayed here, but it did get me thinking about CS Lewis’ book, “The Great Divorce“. He described hell as people living in a grey city, able to build houses as they wanted, and totally unable to live together. They argued, and simply moved away from those they lived around. An endless city of one person living in a house on their own, consumed by their selfishness and self-centredness.

Maybe my hairdresser was right: selfishness rampant, and “hell on earth” … or at least seed’s of hell …

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