Troubled Birmingham council has launched a series of cost-saving exercises to manage the housing department’s finances following tenants’ rejection of stock transfer in the city.
Council leader Albert Bore (pictured) this week announced an action plan with six points aimed at redirecting existing budgets and using resources more effectively.

He said: “These immediate actions will make better use of the money we have to repair and improve council homes, whilst the commission will help us identify how we secure finance for the longer term.”

As the council grapples with an overhanging debt of £900m, two thirds of which relates to its housing debt, it last week advertised for a new chief executive.

The £165,000 post has been vacant since the former chief, Sir Michael Lyons, retired last year.

Crucial to the new housing plan is the cutting back of non-urgent repairs.

The council has a repairs budget of £62m, 90 per cent of which is used for day-to-day response repairs. The council labelled these repairs an “ineffective use of resources [that] will be substantially reduced with immediate effect”.

Head of housing David Thompson stressed the move would not affect urgent requests.

The action plan also states that the council currently has a £51m capital budget, and that a Best Value review found some planned contracts were not achieving the decent homes standard.

Programmes will be reviewed in the light of this finding and, in cases without contractual commitments, resources will be re-directed to the high priority cases.

The housing department management’s costs, which total £60m, will also be under scrutiny.

The department is looking to save £3m this financial year and a further £6m in the next.

Resources will then be redirected to repairs and maintenance work.

Thompson confirmed that the majority of this year’s savings would be achieved from no longer pursuing stock transfer.

The council has already spent in the region of £12m on the doomed transfer project (Housing Today, 11 April).