Swindon Council – what’s the hurry?

This is a Swindon DCH Press Release

Swindon Council on September 24^th will decide whether or not to ballot tenants on the proposal to transfer our housing stock to a Housing Association. Despite the fact that the Council’s ruling group decided to halt the process when the government announced that it was producing a consultation document on a new Housing Finance system, they are proposing to press ahead with a ballot before the government consultation finishes (on October 27^th ).

Lobby of Swindon Council

Swindon TUC Press Release July 8th 2009

Swindon TUC calls on Council to suspend move to transfer Council Housing in the light of government consultation on new Housing Finance system

Housing Minister John Healey has announced that the government is bringing forward proposals to “dismantle the Housing Revenue Account Subsidy system” replacing it with “a devolved system of responsibility and funding”.

The details of the proposals will be published before the summer Parliamentary recess. This has big implications for the current ‘options appraisal’ process taking place in Swindon. The Council was due to vote on a proposal to ballot tenants on transferring our Council Housing to a Housing Association, at its meeting on July 16th.

Campaign to keep our council homes and reject transfer

Swindon Trades Union Council Press Release June 11^th 2009

Campaign to keep our Council homes and reject transfer

After all the resources of Swindon Council were thrown at tenants, driving home the message that ‘there is no alternative’ to transfer our homes to a Housing Association, they have (according to the Evening Advertiser) managed to convince only 191 tenants to tick a box in favour of transfer. On this basis they are prepared to risk losing £1 million, which Council tax payers will have to pay if tenants reject their proposal.

South Cambridgeshire tenants vote against transfer

John Marais, a leading campaigner against privatisation of Council Housing reports on a big No vote by South Cambridgeshire tenants against transfer

South Cambridgeshire tenants have kicked out plans to transfer their homes out of council control with a decisive 72 per cent No vote on a 73 per cent turnout.

Property sales crucial for 59 Housing Associations

Fifty-nine housing associations were entirely dependent on selling homes to generate a surplus last year.

A report on housing association global accounts, published by the Tenant Services Authority this week, suggests that the housing market fall means the regulator is most concerned about a select band of associations which, for the past three years, did not generate enough cash without sales to meet interest payments on their loans.

The report states that property sales are ‘critical for around a third of associations to achieve benchmark levels of interest cover’.

And it reveals that 17 housing associations have been reliant on surpluses from property sales in each of the past three years to generate a surplus or reduce losses.

During 2008 associations made £577 million profit on property sales.

Overall, 83 traditional housing associations have been reliant on asset sales to either post a surplus or negate a loss in the past three years, the report states. Almost 160 associations rely on property sales for at least 25 per cent of their surpluses.

From Inside Housing

“Stop this war against Council tenants”

This is a letter published in today’s Evening Advertiser

“WE must support our council tenants” wrote Michael Wills in his column in the Advertiser. Like other tenants I will be pleased if the rent increase we were expecting this year was reduced by half. However, if Mr Wills really wants to support council tenants in Swindon he might care to support the demand that the council is able to keep all the income from tenants’ rent instead of having to apply for a grant. Does Mr Wills support the government’s negative subsidy to the town of £9m a year? If Swindon was able to keep all the rent it collects then there would be no pressure to transfer us to a housing association.

Council Housing – setting the record straight

This is a letter published in the Swindon Advertiser in response to an inaccurate report of a meeting organised by STUC on the threat of transferrring our Council housing to a Housing Association.

I’m afraid that the report of the Swindon TUC meeting on Council housing contained a number of major errors. I did not say that we were trying to “galvanise enough support to force the Council to hold a ballot”. They would have to hold a ballot if they wanted to press ahead with stock transfer and a majority of tenants would have to vote in favour of it!

What I actually said was that in the consultation taking place, if sufficient tenants expressed their opposition to transfer, then the Council might not proceed with a ballot. If they held one and the tenants rejected transfer then Council tax payers would end up footing a bill of around £1 million.

David Renard, Cabinet member for Housing told me that if the tenants are shown to be opposed to transfer then he would accept that, although in his opinion they would have to recognise that they might not get as good a service as in the past. To a large extext that depends upon a government review on Council housing which is taking taking place at the moment. How much grant we get for management and maintenance costs and major repairs is part of that review. Trades unions and tenant organisations are pressing for funding which measures up to our actual needs.

The report said that “the yearly subsidy stands at £9 million a year”. The £9 million is in fact what the government takes from us. They give us £9 million less than the rent money we raise. This is what is referred to as a “negative subsidy”. There is a national campaign to enable all Councils to keep all the rent that their tenants pay. If the Council were able to keep this money then it is unlikely that they would be considering transfer to a Housing Association in the first place.

By the way there were 24 people at the meeting, not 15.

Readers can visit the website which has been set up to help the campaign to keep our Council homes at:

keepourcouncilhomes.wordpress.com

Martin Wicks

Secretary Swindon TUC

Input to Housing Inquiry

Swindon is carrying out its second ‘options appraisals’. It employed Tribal to report on the finances over the next 30 years. According to this report the projected allowance for management and maintenance, based on the current formula, will be £598 million over the 30 year period; actual costs projected over that period are estimated to be £791 million, or £193 million less than will be needed.

Vote No to transfer

From the Evening Advertiser Letters Page

CAN I please ask all Parks and Walcot tenants to attend a meeting on February 19 at 6.30pm in Goddard Park Primary School. I knew nothing of this meeting until a neighbour informed me. It is a meeting about the council handing its stock (our homes) over to a housing association. This means (no matter what the council says) that our rent could go up as much as £99 per week. I know this as my friend lives in Park North, literally a stones throw from my house, she has a three-bedroom terrace and so do I, she pays £99 a week, I pay £74. I have a leaflet that says the decision is ours and we can vote on this matter, so please attend the meeting and vote No. The meeting will be attended by DWA (the council’s independent advisors) and Mike Ash (SBC deputy director of housing). I for one will be voting against, so please join me, for if we all vote no then they can’t do it – can they?

CLARE BELL Park North Swindon

Housing Associations in trouble?

At the very time when Swindon Council is carrying out an ‘options appraisal’ to consider transferring our housing stock to a Housing Association, Housing Associations are in difficulty owing to the ‘credit crunch’.

 

Labour Research reports that many of the country’s biggest banks are making it difficult for Housing Associations to access credit, with some industry executives warning that “some failing housing associations may even have to be nationalised.”

 

The seven lenders to the industry, including RBS (70% owned by the government) and Lloyds (43% owned by the government) have been accused of taking any chance to reprice existing loans to HA’s which could maintain ‘social housing’.

 

Tom Dacey, Chair of the G15 Group of big London based HA’s warned:

 

“If nothing changes, our sector is going to be devastated and nobody is going to build social housing.”

 

One HA executive said an RBS banker had told him that bank was “looking for any opportunity to raise existing interest rates.” RBS did not confirm or deny the claim but Mark Amis, head of social housing at Lloyds, admitted banks would look to reprice loans wherever possible.

 

“Industry insiders” told LR that they are worried about banks hindering the traditional rescue model for the sector, where larger organisations take over smaller struggling ones to protect tenants. Some in the industry have warned that if failed organisations were allowed to go under, the government could be forced to mount a bail-out, which could see parts of the sector re-nationalised.

 

David Orr, Chief Executive of the National Housing Federation, which represents the HA’s said:

 

“If we are not able to continue arranging rescues with the sector, there may have to be a government bail-out of a smaller association. That would be a guarantee and would effectively put the whole sector in the hands of the government.”

 

The government is in talks with the industry to ensure that it can continue to provide social housing and one option may be to put pressure on part-nationalised banks to open credit lines. The Treasury may be reluctant to do this as it has promised not to get involved in the day to day management of state controlled banks.