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Social housing across Western Europe has become significantly more residualised as governments concentrate on helping vulnerable households. Many countries are trying to reduce the concentrations of deprivation by building for a wider range of households and tenures. In England this policy has two main strands: (1) including other tenures when regenerating areas originally built as mono-tenure social housing estates and (2) introducing social rented and low-cost homeownership into new private market developments through planning obligations. By examining where new social housing and low-cost home ownership homes have been built and who moves into them, this paper examines whether these policies achieve social mix and reduce spatial concentrations of deprivation. The evidence suggests that new housing association development has enabled some vulnerable households to live in areas which are not deprived, while some better-off households have moved into more deprived areas. But these trends have not been sufficient to stem increases in deprivation in the most deprived areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Structural change in rural areas has led to a differentiation in the ranges of experience of rural life Within generally prosperous localities, some individuals may be unable to achieve what is widely accepts as an adequate standard of frying. This article focuses on the barriers That individuals face with respect to participation in residual local labour markets in rural areas. A variety of factors influence capacity to participate. Empirical evidence is provided from a study that used in-depth interviews in two rural case study areas. The article assesses the barriers influencing labour market participation identified in the interviews, including the mismatch between skills and opportunities, recruitment practices accessibility the costs of labour market participation and housing. All may be influenced by the rural nature of the locations. The approach offers a framework for a qualitative analysis of labour markets from an individual perspective, avoiding the presumption of a common experience of a labour market determined by the general characteristics of labour market conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]