IWCA reveals staggering extent of council homes sell-off

[haggy]

The councils could surely find sites (they own loads of land and buildings all over London already) to do this.

Giles..

actually, they no longer do. hackney council certainly, and its probably true for islington also, has flogged off much of its spare land and buildings to fill a deficit hole caused by incompetent management, and at outrageously cut- rate prices, too. so we have a proliferation of yuppie flats, and cuts in social services (broadly defined), and council tax hike-ups.

it's a generous idea you have of councils, giles, but even if they could spend the £££ from sales on building more council housing, they wouldn't since it is seriously prohibited by central govt..

incidentally. 'affordable housing' is a misnomer - before anyone comes up with that as an alternative - and its also the case the other so-called social landlords are only building 'social hosuing' where they can also build private hosuing for sale, thus reducing councils' ability to meet increasing requirements to house people on their hosuing lists. in hackney its clear that where stock transfer has occurred it has seriously retsricted the council's ability to house people it has - theoretically - a statutory duty to house. and guess who ends up paying for this inefficiency in high rents to private hostels etc - council tax payers and general taxes funding the housing benefit system.

in other words, public money going directly to subsidise private profit, yet again... and all engineered by New Labour (but equally enthusiastically pursued by councils of all persuasions)

 

[ViolentPanda]

I thought the rulles didn't allow councils to spend capital receipts from selling houses on new builds?

Absolutely correct.

 

[William of Walworth]

My understanding in previous examples (Hackney and Lambeth for starters) is that the money is used to reduce C Tax bills.

I thought the rulles didn't allow councils to spend capital receipts from selling houses on new builds?

Absolutely correct

But how are exo's and jannerboy's statements compatible, given ringfencing of housing revenues?? Or is selling council hosuing OFF not ringfenced?

Clariification welcomed

 

[ViolentPanda]

But how are exo's and jannerboy's statements compatible, given ringfencing of housing revenues?? Or is selling council hosuing OFF not ringfenced?

Clariification welcomed

Here's the real sickener, just for you William.

Capital receipts can't be used.

Interest on the capital receipts can.

Wandsworth council, who probably sold more social housing than any other London Borough, were able to use the interest (also utilising the money from their unfair local government grant, originally set by Tory westminster for Tory Wandsworth, the "showpiece" Tory local authority) to directly lower poll and then council tax bills for over a decade

 

[kea]

some of the big london housing associations who are selling properties off (eg. peabody) claim it's to help meet the decent homes standard across their remaining properties. i dunno if it's the same for islington council, it will be interesting to find out.

 

[belboid]

that's the claim pretty much across the country, ime, kea. They don't spend anything on council housing for ten years, then go "oh, it's too expensive to modernise to decent homes standards, so we'll have to knock it all down/sell it off and rebuild 'mixed estates' instead"

 

[kea]

quite.

 

[William of Walworth]

Which takes us back to the Aylesbury ...

(the thread oin this is still lingering somewhere around page 2 (?) of the London Forum)

Cheers for that info, Violent Panda.

 

[Joe Reilly]

No, I don't think people in social housing should only live in flats.

I'm saying I am all in favour of councils selling off "street" properties in very expensive parts of London, PROVIDED that they use the proceeds to house more people in a cheaper area by building more places. With the proceeds from selling an overpriced million quid house in parts of London, you could provide 5 houses elsewhere, which would be better for the people waiting for accommodation, wouldn't it?

Giles..

Funny how the oh so terribly important 'social mix' argument, employed when an area is being stealthily gentrified, goes completely out the window when a whole borough is being socially cleansed?

 

[Joe Reilly]

some of the big london housing associations who are selling properties off (eg. peabody) claim it's to help meet the decent homes standard across their remaining properties. i dunno if it's the same for islington council, it will be interesting to find out.

What is the spend the millions the take in rents on again?

 

[Joe Reilly]

What is the money being used for in Islington?

To subsidise PFI contractors working for Homes for Islington - easily the least efficient way to get value for money.

 

[nino_savatte]

some of the big london housing associations who are selling properties off (eg. peabody) claim it's to help meet the decent homes standard across their remaining properties. i dunno if it's the same for islington council, it will be interesting to find out.

I'm with the Peabody Trust and I get the feeling the Trust overstretched itself in the scramble for stock transfers. There are 3 flats on my estate that are all to be auctioned off. These properties will not be replaced and lord knows what the Trust will spend the money on.

 

[kea]

What is the spend the millions the take in rents on again?

i know.
rents are going up btw - rent restructuring just been agreed.

 

[kea]

I'm with the Peabody Trust and I get the feeling the Trust overstretched itself in the scramble for stock transfers.

they also lost a fair bit of money on new build schemes like bedzed a while back, meaning they're now on a 'cautious' financial regime.

 

[aurora green]

i know.

Are you going to tell us?

 

[kea]

Are you going to tell us?

uh - i took it joe's question was rhetorical. therefore my 'i know' was saying 'yes, i see your point'.

 

[nino_savatte]

they also lost a fair bit of money on new build schemes like bedzed a while back, meaning they're now on a 'cautious' financial regime.

I almost forgot about those. There's a massive development in Docklands and one in Stoke Newington.

Presumably this new 'cautious' financial regime was responsible for the demise of the estate office. Meanwhile I am still waiting for them to carry out repairs to my property after reporting them almost two months ago.

 

[treelover]

Surely these injustices will continue until we get an effective Left again, for me, (and i used to be against parties as such) there is an urgent need to create a new workers party to defend what is best about the welfare state such as housing, welfare, etc. Many people feel abandoned by the state but have no where else to turn. I know there is Defend Council Housing but it doesn't seem to get much attention

sometimes, i feel moaning is all we can do

 

[aurora green]

uh - i took it joe's question was rhetorical. therefore my 'i know' was saying 'yes, i see your point'.

My mistake. sorry.






What does all the rent go on anyway, I wonder?

 

[kea]

reaching decent homes standard, servicing debt, mergers and takeovers (happening at lot at the moment), completing vast amounts of paperwork for the inspection regime, paying ever-increasing salaries to senior staff ...
(that's off the top of my head btw, not comprehensive!!)

edit: re: salary - the number of housing association chief executives taking home a salary of more than £150,000 has trebled in the past year. David Cowans at Places for People took home over £300,000 this year, replacing John Belcher from Anchor Trust, as the highest paid chief exec; Mr Belcher got a salary of £211,277.
Average pay is £111,000.

 

[Joe Reilly]

i know.
rents are going up btw - rent restructuring just been agreed.

The basic plan is to make social housing rents match market rents and then cap housing benefit probably at the rate of the 'poorer area' Giles thinks we should all live in. The choice then is to make up the difference or get out. Mugabe pulled a similar stunt only with bulldozers.

 

[kea]

yeah i know. they've been stalling on the rent restructuring details but have announced this week ...
it does surprise me how little attention most people pay to national housing policy - i guess it's because it's increasingly seen as a 'them and us' situation, where the target middle class voters don't think they'll ever need to use social housing and therefore aren't interested in it.
housing does suffer from vast amounts of jargon and hot air which i don't think would be quite as bad if it came under the same amount of public scrutiny as health, education etc.

 

[aurora green]

God, this thread's getting v. depressing.

 

[kea]

sorry

 

[belboid]

Funny how the oh so terribly important 'social mix' argument, employed when an area is being stealthily gentrified, goes completely out the window when a whole borough is being socially cleansed?

Indeed. Several area's near me are being demolished at the moment, but it's most peculiar how it's the former council estate that is being pushed as a new experimental 'mixed estate' whereas the largely private sector housing that is being demolished is getting....almost nothing but private housing. Net loss of council homes, around 200 (minimum), not gain in private hmes, about 100.

Also, there was something surprisingly interesting in a recent edition of New Start (regeneration magazine) which was pointing out how on many of the mixed estates that have gone up already, the private housing is actually simply being bought for rent back to the council to fill with people they must statutorily house! So the estates arent mixed anyway. Seemingly there were not enough middle-class people who wanted to go into the mix.

 

[nino_savatte]

reaching decent homes standard, servicing debt, mergers and takeovers (happening at lot at the moment), completing vast amounts of paperwork for the inspection regime, paying ever-increasing salaries to senior staff ...
(that's off the top of my head btw, not comprehensive!!)

edit: re: salary - the number of housing association chief executives taking home a salary of more than £150,000 has trebled in the past year. David Cowans at Places for People took home over £300,000 this year, replacing John Belcher from Anchor Trust, as the highest paid chief exec; Mr Belcher got a salary of £211,277.
Average pay is £111,000.

There really is no need for HA chief execs to take home this kind of money when their own workforce is on a fraction of that pay. HA's have got it all back to front imv.

 

[Herbert Read]

Just lit up his crack-pipe by the sound of it.

i wouldnt dare in case LLETSA and Chuck did a sweeney with a flying picket at my house.

I assure you i sleep safer with the IWCA stealing the grass roots support of fascism and defending my right to live in council housing.

 

[newbie]

Indeed. Several area's near me are being demolished at the moment, but it's most peculiar how it's the former council estate that is being pushed as a new experimental 'mixed estate' whereas the largely private sector housing that is being demolished is getting....almost nothing but private housing. Net loss of council homes, around 200 (minimum), not gain in private hmes, about 100.

Also, there was something surprisingly interesting in a recent edition of New Start (regeneration magazine) which was pointing out how on many of the mixed estates that have gone up already, the private housing is actually simply being bought for rent back to the council to fill with people they must statutorily house! So the estates arent mixed anyway. Seemingly there were not enough middle-class people who wanted to go into the mix.

you're equating home ownership with 'middle class'. Personally I prefer the formulation 'people with choices' because that's what differentiates those who have options (however economically limited) about where they can live from those whose only hope is from bureacratic allocation.

Doesn't this arise because those (majority working class) who can choose don't want to live on a particular estate, so home prices won't rise above the level buy-to-let landlords find attractive?

 

[Sean]

i wouldnt dare in case LLETSA and Chuck did a sweeney with a flying picket at my house.

I assure you i sleep safer with the IWCA stealing the grass roots support of fascism and defending my right to live in council housing.

I believe you are the one on the left.

 

[belboid]

you're equating home ownership with 'middle class'. Personally I prefer the formulation 'people with choices' because that's what differentiates those who have options (however economically limited) about where they can live from those whose only hope is from bureacratic allocation.

Doesn't this arise because those (majority working class) who can choose don't want to live on a particular estate, so home prices won't rise above the level buy-to-let landlords find attractive?

I think this depends on a numbr of factors. The point of 'mixed estates' is precisely that they do attract the 'middle-class' as well as working-class families with a bit of cash. The w-c 'with choices' would predominantly go into the homes (unspecified number thus far) of 'affordable homes for sale' - probably a mix of rent to buy/shared ownership.

The fact is tho, as you say, that many people simply don't want to live n those estates - sometimes through memories of what it once was, sometimes because they don't like the surrounding area.

And sometimes because property developers/investors have recognised the shortage of housing for the homeless, and have realised that they can make a killing by buying the houses and renting them back to the council at well above market rent. There's an estate in Wandsworth (I think, have to chekc tomorrow) where exactly that has happened - one investor bought the lot. That investor is one Grant Bovey, btw.