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PM Gordon Brown, June 18, 2007: “I cannot promise to implement the fourth option on council housing... but what I will tell you is that councils will be allowed to build homes again.” |
Fresh battle looms on home front as tenants vow to scupper sell-offs
In from the cold: how outright rejection gave way to encouraging words from minister
BATTLE-weary but determined, campaigning council tenants who have repeatedly revolted against plans to privatise their homes are trying to resurrect the Blitz spirit of the past in the face of Camden’s latest sell-off proposals.
The protesters are angry at the council’s sales of street properties and sections of council estates to raise money to pay for a backlog of refurbishment work.
In a campaign strategy meeting on the Peckwater estate in Kentish Town last Monday, tenants vowed to mobilise once more by going door-to-door on estates, speaking to fellow residents and challenging the Town Hall to think again. They want tenants to reject new proposals being circulated by housing officials and councillors.
The rebel tenants are massing behind the rallying cry of pressure group Defend Council Housing (DCH), which demands direct investment from the government to pay for the overdue repair work. They say housing minister Yvette Cooper is no longer shooing away the campaign out of hand and, unlike her predecessors, agreed to meet the tenants two weeks ago.
Tenants’ leader Alan Walter, who lives in Kentish Town and is a main organiser of DCH, said: “In the past, they haven’t even entertained us. At least, Yvette Cooper let me make our case to her, even if at the moment we don’t have a cheque on the table.”
To Liberal Democrat council leader Councillor Keith Moffitt, the attempts to prise money out of ministers have been like “a search for fool’s gold”, which has left the council to raise the money itself.
He is encouraging tenants to embrace a new budget announcement pledging £15 million of council funds to pay for repairs.
“We have to be realistic,” said Cllr Moffitt. “While the government has talked about doing more with council housing, there has been no indication that Camden will get anywhere.
“The previous Labour administration seemed to be happy to follow a search for fool’s gold of [direct] investment. We are showing here that we are committed to refurbishing our estates rather than waiting and doing nothing.”
Housing is giving the Lib Dem and Conservative coalition one of its biggest headaches.
While it wants to meet election promises to bring council homes up to scratch, it will face a huge resistance from tenants if it tries to pay for the work by hiving off homes.
The £15 million coming out of Town Hall coffers is only a drop in the ocean compared to nearly £300 million needed to repair all estates.
Council tenants have emphatically opposed all forms of transfer, most recently when they voted down plans to shift control of homes to an outside body known as an Arm’s Length Management Organisation (Almo), similar to the part-privatised set-up used by neighbouring Islington and Westminster.
The government has doggedly stuck to the rule that money should only be given to councils which agree to give up management in some form.
A defiant Mr Walter pledged this week: “We’ve been here in the past with stock transfer in the 1990s and the Almo three years ago. We weren’t beaten then and we won’t let them beat us now.
“We don’t want to lose our secure tenancies, that’s what matters most to tenants.” |
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