Voters will back help for working poor
Westminster's plan to give people with jobs priority on its council homes list will be controversial - but it may be copied elsewhere in the capital.
The idea is essentially to penalise those who choose to live on benefits, while helping the shockingly high number of working Londoners who live in poverty.
It will put those unemployed people who do not get council homes in an even tougher position. Some might choose to live a layabout lifestyle. Others are just down on their luck.
The new government cap on housing benefit will make it even harder for those forced to rent in the private sector. The Mayor and others have warned that claimants will be pushed into the outer boroughs.
Westminster is Tory-controlled, but the idea is not far from something Labour leader Ed Miliband floated yesterday - councils rewarding people "who show responsibility" when it comes to housing.
He was less forthright on the flipside of such rewards when there's a limited supply of social housing: some people will get shut out.
Councils will face hard choices. Some working families will benefit; some blameless benefit claimants will probably suffer.
In the end voters are likely to back authorities that reward those trying to work their way out of poverty.
