PUSHBACK Talks
Cities are becoming increasingly unliveable for most people. Costs are rising but incomes are not. Sky-high rents, evictions, homelessness, and substandard housing are common realities for urban dwellers across the planet. There is a global housing crisis. How did this basic human right get so lost? Who is pushing people out of their homes and cities, and what’s being done to pushback?
On the heels of the release of the award-winning documentary, PUSH, filmmaker, Fredrik Gertten and Leilani Farha, the former UN Special Rapporteur on the right to housing, have reconvened. Join the filmmaker and the advocate as they reflect on their experiences making PUSH and exchange ideas and stories about the film's central issue: the financialization of housing and its fall-out.
For more about PUSH and to view it: www.pushthefilm.com
For more about Fredrik Gertten and his other films: www.wgfilm.com
For more about Leilani Farha in her new role, Global Director of The Shift: www.make-the-shift.org
PUSHBACK Talks
The Rent is Too Damn High: Making the Case Against Landlords
This week on Pushback Talks, Fredrik and Leilani explore a bold proposition: What if we put the business of landlordism on trial?
Nick Bano's latest work, "Against Landlords: How to Solve the Housing Crisis," serves as our guide. Bano, a barrister specializing in representing marginalized groups, takes us on a journey through the history of housing law in the UK, tracing its evolution from the Victorian era to the present day. He illuminates how this legal landscape has shifted, contributing to the current crisis of unaffordability and skyrocketing rents.
Today, 1 in 21 people in the UK is a landlord, a staggering statistic that underscores the imbalance in our housing system. In this episode, Fredrik, Leilani, and Nick delve into the repercussions of this disparity, exploring how the profitability of housing impacts our ability to address the crisis. Together, they examine the potential solutions and reflect on how close Britain came to outlawing landlords.