A paper, seen by Housing Today, will go to housing minister Lord Falconer next week to back the bid to convince the Treasury that the project to turn round blighted neighbourhoods, mainly in the north, is soundly based.
The paper was drawn up by Liverpool, Manchester and Birmingham councils following Falconer’s meeting in Leeds last week with housing specialists, developers and lenders (Housing Today, 24 January).
The idea’s proponents, including the National Housing Federation, northern housing forums and the Key Cities Group, want the government to put in pump-priming cash to develop structures for the programme ahead of its likely start in April 2004.
The aim would be to create market renewal partnerships, which could be limited companies, responsible for running the programme.
They would be council-driven and include social landlords among other stakeholders, through the local strategic partnerships for each area.
The partnerships would be responsible for a prospectus that details what action is needed, who will deliver it, where the money will come from, and monitor progress to agreed outcomes.
The prospectus, a prerequisite for funding, would include a 10-year target as well as rolling three-year programmes to stay within government budget timescales.
The discussion paper warns of the scale of the task ahead: “Development will require the co-ordination of the asset management strategies of up to two dozen RSLs, two or three local authorities, hundreds of private landlords and thousands of home owners.
“The strategy will, in the first decade, involve tens of thousands of individual actions by housing agencies to deliver the change programme.”
Liverpool hopes to pilot the idea in partnership with Knowsley and Sefton councils. Executive member for housing Richard Kemp said: “Nobody is under the illusion that a cheque is on its way. We need time to build teams of professionals to deliver this.
“I think a specific market renewal fund is needed because extra council or regional development agency money does not give the substance for the major restructuring we envisage.”
The East Lancashire Partnership of Blackburn, Burnley, Hyndburn, Pendle and Rossendale councils also hopes to bid. It too favours a special organisation to deliver the programme.
Local housing forum chair David Riley said: “A new structure would give the government, communities and the private sector confidence that we can deliver. Neighbourhoods could bid under agreed criteria with the decisions made transparently.”
Source
Housing Today
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