Thursday, 17 April 2025
Podcast: Andrew Bibby and Co-operative Housing
Andrew Bibby, the author and journalist whose book These Houses Are Ours tells the story of the first wave of co-operative housing in the period until the end of the First World War, is the guest on the latest Red Heaven podcast from oral historian and interviewer Dr Simon Machin. Simon describes his podcasts – which now total over sixty – as 'a growing oral history archive of interviews about the utopian socialists and reformers who fought for justice in industrial Britain' and past podcasts have featured discussions about, among others, John Ruskin, Keir Hardie, and the Suffragettes. His latest podcast is the first to focus specifically on an aspect of the history of British co-operation.
Simon invited Andrew to discuss with him some of the key features of the co-op movement's engagement in housing, including the proposal by the Co-operative Wholesale Society's Ben Jones to establish a more co-operative form of housing tenure than either owner-occupation or conventional tenancy. Andrew recounts how Jones's Tenant Co-operators society, which was established in the late 1880s and which paid a dividend to its member-tenants from profits, was an early pioneer in this respect.
The podcast moves on to explore the story of the rapid growth of co-operative housing societies in the years after 1900, including the role of Henry Vivian and his Co-partnership Tenants venture. Vivian, who was associated with the wing of the co-operative movement that promoted 'co-partnership' between labour and capital, was instrumental in helping bring what we would now call community share capital into fledgling co-op housing societies around the country, including a significant investment from George Bernard Shaw. As Andrew and Simon discuss, Vivian's later role was considerably more controversial however and indirectly led to many societies demutualising.
The very close links in this period between co-operative housing and the very young Garden City movement is also highlighted, in particular the role played by radical architect Raymond Unwin in promoting low-density 'garden villages' and 'garden suburbs'. Almost every new co-op housing initiative after the first few years of the twentieth century was designed on garden village principles.
The podcast also reminds listeners that – against all the odds – ten of the housing societies established in the years before 1914 are still operating successfully today as independent co-operative societies providing housing for their members.
Andrew Bibby says, "It was a pleasure to take part in this podcast and to add a little bit of co-operative history to what is already the very impressive archive developed by Simon Machin. I hope we'll be able to encourage him to look at other aspects of early co-op history for future episodes."
These Houses Are Ours: Co-operative and community-led housing alternatives, 1870-1919, is published by Britain's first author-run publishing co-operative (Gritstone Publishing). With the first print-run sold out it has recently been reprinted.
See also:
Hebden Bridge Local History Society Report: The early co-operative housing movement and Hebden Bridge's part in it