DCH takes 'Fourth Option' campaign to Labour conference » Housing » 24dash.com

Defend Council Housing is preparing to take its 'Fourth Option' campaign to next week's Labour Party Conference.

Last week the TUC voted unanimously in support of direct investment in council housing and DCH is hopeful Labour Party delegates in Bournemouth will do the same.

The last three consecutive Labour Party conferences have opposed 'privatisation' of council housing and backed direct investment to improve existing and build new local authority stock.

Seventeen constituency Labour Parties have submitted contemporary motions supporting the ‘Fourth Option’ to the Labour Party conference.

Although party officials recommended earlier this week that all motions should be ruled out, DCH claims some are now back on the agena.

Austin Mitchell MP, chair of the House of Commons Council Housing group is arguing that all seventeen motions should be accepted.

He said: “Anything less will inevitably be seen as a crude attempt to sanitise the conference agenda and try and hide the fact that so many Constituency Labour Parties decided to submit a contemporary motion underlining the policy passed at the last three conferences on investment in council housing.”

According to Alan Walter Chair of Defend Council Housing, the crisis in the private housing market makes the case for investment in first public housing.

He said: “Ministers have lost the argument. There is overwhelming support for the ‘Fourth Option’ for council housing and everything that has happened in the last few weeks re-enforces the case for a first public housing sector that provides ‘decent, affordable, secure and accountable housing’ which the private sector never has and shows no signs of doing in the future.

"This issue will test the Prime Minister’s capacity to not just listen but also then respect the views of three million council tenants, 1.6 million households on council waiting lists and many councillors and MPs.

"It’s about government respecting our choice and putting people before private profits and political dogma.”

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