Selling off council homes at a discount is not costing the government as much as critics believe, he says – and to raise the temperature even more, he's compiled new figures that suggest councils aren't actually spending the money they get from capital receipts on housing in any case (see lead story, page 7).
The Conservatives' plan to allow tenants of housing associations to buy their homes at a bigger discount than at present is unlikely to keep many social landlord chiefs awake at night. It would be fraught with legal difficulties, including having to sweep aside charity law, and besides, the Tories still look a long way from 10 Downing Street.
What the proposal does do, if nothing else, is draw attention to the myriad of rules and regulations that currently govern the one million-plus tenants in the social housing sector, some of whom already have the right to buy at a discount or the right to acquire at just under the market rate. The rules can be unfair or illogical to both tenants and landlords.
Wilcox, by contrast to Davis, has no political axe to grind. His arguments run along academic, rather than ideological, lines.
Councils are not spending the money from capital receipts on housing
But his findings, which go against conventional wisdom, will have far more immediate repercussions in the sector.
Until now, the sums have always been done in order to show that selling council homes at a discount benefits only the buyer and exacerbates the housing crisis in the process. Wilcox's new slant may not convince many critics to change their minds but it could bolster what seems to be the government's current stance on the right to buy: ironing out abuses while keeping the basic policy intact.
Wilcox's view is that councils would be better off with the cash in hand, ploughing the money back into new housing or repairs. Labour spent years in opposition saying it would free up capital receipts to do just that. Councils spent years banging the same drum. Ironically, now that this is firmly government policy, councils seem to be spending the money on swimming pools, or not at all, rather than repairing homes. Now, that's something on which David
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Housing Today
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