Need is central to social housing, but it isn't the only consideration that has ever shaped access. Local connections, eligibility and qualification rules also matter. We should be able to debate those rules without pretending that one simple principle has always answered every case.
The post-war promise of "homes fit for heroes" expressed an idea of obligation to people who had served, alongside a wider need to improve housing. The 1919 legislation helped expand council provision. That history doesn't mean every council house was originally a personal reward for military service, or that concern for need appeared only later.
It does show that housing policy has carried more than one understanding of what the country owes its people.
Which connection should count?
A person's years living or working in an area can be relevant to a discussion of connection. So can family and care responsibilities. Those are different considerations from where someone happened to be born.
The legal position needs care. Housing allocation and homelessness duties aren't one identical queue, and a local-connection test doesn't mean every applicant must pass the same five tests to receive the strongest claim. Rules also need to protect people who must leave an area because they aren't safe there.
The policy question is which connections should reasonably matter, how they interact with need and what exceptions are necessary.
Citizens shouldn't have different grades of belonging
I don't support dividing citizens into permanent categories according to birthplace. Someone who arrived young and has contributed for decades can have a much stronger practical connection to a place than someone born there who left long ago.
A rule intended to recognise contribution should consider the contribution. A rule intended to recognise local attachment should consider the attachment. Birthplace is an unreliable substitute for either.
None of this produces enough homes by itself. Allocation rules decide who receives a scarce resource; they don't remove the shortage. We need to discuss fairness in the queue and the conditions making the queue so long. Treating one as a substitute for the other leaves a large part of the problem unanswered.