Housing Corporation hopes to double its grant funds in spending review

Corporation chief executive Norman Perry told Housing Today the quango has the capacity to deliver twice the current grant programme.

But if the government wants quick spending, any extra money from next month's spending review would go to southern England, not the North.

Perry admitted this year's round of grants, which saw a big increase in cash for key workers in the South, had provoked protests from Northern organisations worried that money is being shifted away from them.

Perry said former housing minister Lord Falconer had wanted starter homes projects boosted. He said: "We have owned up that political decisions are being made by ministers." The corporation's temporary solution was to cut the cash available while keeping up the allocations. Perry said: "If they all rushed ahead with their schemes, there would not be enough cash, but in reality that is not normally a problem."

With increasing pressure from the South for new homes, ministers could opt for a quick cash injection. That would mean the North lost out, Perry said. But he stressed that if extra spending is planned to increase gradually over three years, more geographical balance could be achieved: "Northern schemes are often bound up with regeneration programmes that take longer in the pipeline."

But he denied the corporation planned to take the entire programme south and replace it with the market renewal fund in the North.

Perry said talks are also going on with the Treasury on redefining the corporation's outputs. It is currently committed to a target of 56,000 new homes or lettings over three years.

"We have asked for changes that reflect our other work such as new tools for private sector improvement and regeneration," said Perry.

He said the sector should not complain over each region's slice of the grant cake. "They should look at the actual amount of money. We are battling for a bigger cake altogether."