Tory councillor dismisses Policy Exchange council house sell-off plans

Published by Max Salsbury for 24dash.com in Housing and also in Finance, Local Government

A Barnet Council cabinet member has dismissed right-wing think tank Policy Exchange's recommendations to sell-off the UK's most expensive social housing.

Whilst agreeing with the thrust of the report, Cllr Tom Davey does not believe that such a scheme would work in his borough, the Barnet and Whetstone Press reported.

The Tory said: “It is a very sensible idea because it doesn’t make any sense to have high-value housing stock for one family when you could house other families.

“But my attitude towards the housing market is to keep as much stock as you can as the housing prices in London are only going to go one way.”

Cllr Davey said that Barnet Council had no plans to sell-off its more expensive housing.

The Policy Exchange report advised councils and housing associations to sell their most expensive housing to fund the building of more social housing. The report concluded that £4.5bn could be raised annually in this fashion, which it claims could be used to build 80,000-170,000 new social homes a year.

The paper drew a lukewarm response from No 10 – but the housing minister Grant Shapps said it was “blindingly obvious” that local authorities should seek to sell properties worth “millions” in order to use their resources “more efficiently”. However, Cllr Davey said: “We have the capacity to borrow up to £40million against our existing housing stock, if we want to.

“If we have council land that doesn’t have good resale value, we would use that land and keep the other assets.”