Conservative-run Macclesfield Council has suffered a blow to its stock transfer hopes from the town's Tory MP.
Sir Nicholas Winterton MP claimed the idea of allowing a housing association to take on more than 5000 homes amounted to "selling off the family silver" and told tenants they had "a good case for voting no".

In reply, the leader of the council branded Winterton's comments "shameful, misleading, unhelpful … cheap populism", and said Winterton was "doing a disservice to tenants to try to politicise [the transfer]".

Winterton, who had a meeting with housing minister Keith Hill at the end of April, called on the government to allow Macclesfield to keep the money it earned from right-to-buy sales.

When I met Keith Hill he admitted that Macclesfield was being treated unfairly

Sir Nicholas Winterton, MP for Macclesfield

Because it is debt-free, it pays back £8.5m of its £14m annual housing revenue. Winterton said: "When I met Hill he admitted that Macclesfield, as a debt-free authority, was being treated unfairly."

Source

Housing Today