Evening Leader 19 March 2009

Wrexham tenants may get a chance to voice views on landlords

A FRESH tenants' ballot on transferring homes to a not-for-profit landlord is among the ideas to be considered in a major review of Wrexham Council housing due to begin soon.
In the last ballot on the issue held in 2004, 60 per cent of council tenants voted against a transfer.But, according to council leader, Cllr Aled Roberts, the issue will be back on the agenda for discussion as preparation of the new Housing Revenue Account Business Plan gets under way.The far-reaching strategy covers the future of housing in the county borough over the next 30 years.It will be hammered out by councillors and officers before being passed for approval to the Welsh Assembly Government.The council's landlord services manager, Fred Czulowski, said it was estimated that the authority needed to spend a massive £790 million over the coming three decades to keep its housing stock up to the standards demanded by the Assembly Government.He said there was currently a shortfall in funding the council's stock of about £450 million, which would need to be addressed.Although the authority had carried out a considerable amount of modernisation work in recent years, including upgrading kitchens, bathrooms and heating systems, more money would need to be spent as properties - the majority were built over 60 years ago - became older.Cllr Roberts said: "We have made record levels of investment in our housing stock but the reality is the shortfall is still there and we are not able to meet the standards required even with this level of investment."He explained that while there were government restrictions on the amount of money local councils were able to spend on their housing stock, the same constraints did not apply to other organisations.But the problem in Wrexham, he said, was that a transfer to an association was not likely as the "vast majority" of tenants wanted to stay with the council.On the question of a new transfer ballot, Cllr Roberts said it would be just one of a range of options to be considered by the group responsible for preparing the new housing revenue account business plan.He added: "We cannot rule out a fresh ballot but there is no pressure from the Welsh Assembly Government to move towards one."
By phil robinson

New Threat to Council Housing

Wrexham Against Stock Transfer was set up in 2003 to fight the transfer of council housing to a private not for profit landlord “Tai Wrexham”. On a shoestring budget and against a council campaign that spent nearly a million pounds, tenants rejected stock transfer by a comfortable majority. Two years later the council conducted an extensive opinion pole with a view to re-balloting and found that attitudes had hardened with only 20% actually in favour of transfer.
Campaigners believed that was the end of the matter but those vocal members of the local tenants federation had other ideas. 2008 we had a new plan stock transfer on one estate. Luckily the council don’t want to brake up the housing stock so have hit that idea into the long grass.
This week however we have seen a big new development, Aled Roberts leader of the council announcing that our housing stock will need 800 million pounds spending on it over the next 30 years and will only have 400 million to spend. His view is that we only have one option to deal with this shortfall, stock transfer.
So we tenants who are against stock transfer are getting back together. If the council want to try again we will be ready and we will win again.