Council publishes pledges on housing sell-off bid (From This Is Local London)

Council publishes pledges on housing sell-off bid

3:36pm Wednesday 4th August 2010 in Where I Live By Oliver Evans

Tenant rep Jennie Ferrigno and a tenant with the standard. Pic: Wycombe District Council.

BOSSES have promised improvements to council houses in a series of pledges to try and win support to sell them off.

Wycombe District Council has published ‘The Red Kite Standard’, listing what it says are benefits of a sell off. It pledges a 30-year programme of work costing £382m.

It wants tenants to vote through selling its 6,200 homes to Red Kite Community Housing, formed to take on the homes. This would net the council millions.

Council bosses said transfer would go ‘far beyond’ improvements offered by WDC as Red Kite would not have to hand half the rent cash back to Government, as the council does.

But critics questioned whether this would be delivered – and warned tenants faced a more uncertain future under a housing association backed by private finance.

The standard says homes would have ‘modern facilities’ including ‘quality new kitchens and bathrooms, double glazing and central heating’.

It said in a statement: “Should the transfer take place, Red Kite would be contractually bound by us to deliver the Red Kite Standard.”

The standard says Red Kite ‘plans to’ offer facilities including:

• A new kitchen for homes with one more than 15 years old, within five years of transfer.

• A new bathroom for homes with one more than 20 years old, within five years of transfer. All over 25 years would then be replaced.

• New boilers for homes with one more than 12 years old, within five years of transfer. They would then be replaced every 12 years.

• Survey the outside of homes every five years and ‘carry out necessary’ work.

It says it ‘would’:

• Set up an ‘extensive programme to replace or repair windows and doors where required’. All homes which need double glazing will get it within five years.

• Set up a ‘low cost elderly and vulnerable person’s re-decoration programme’.

• Maintain electric systems and ‘respond to them quickly’.

Jennie Ferrigno, chairman of Red Kite’s shadow board, said: “Tenants and leaseholders have been heavily involved in developing this standard to make sure that it delivers what people need and want to see.”

Martyn Hale, council head of homes and housing, said: “It is a standard that the council aspires to but cannot deliver due to the financial constraints we have to work under.”

Labour demanded all council houses meeting a basic standard, called the Decent Homes standard, and this will be met this year in Wycombe.

Yet WDC says it does not go far enough because it has to give about half its rent cash -£11.5m – back to the Government, which then goes to more ‘in need’ areas.

The vote – set for the autumn – is costing the council about £1m. A vote to transfer to a housing association was rejected in 2000 and a 2004 WDC poll found most against it.

Paul Burnham, of campaign group Defend Council Housing, branded the pledges ‘aspirational’.

He said: “Promises don’t always get delivered. It is privatisation, it means the council loses its accountability to the general public.

“It is influenced by private funders. If the business plan goes wrong, they will intervene and decide what happens to people’s homes.”

Labour suggested towards the end of its term in office that the system of councils giving housing rents to the Government be abolished.

The total UK housing debt should instead be shared, it said – but WDC said this left it worse off.

Mr Burnham said the council should look more closely at this as it could negotiate down their payment.