NFA Condemns Plans To End Security Of Council Housing » Housing » 24dash.com

The National Federation of ALMOs (NFA) has called for the Government to safeguard the long term tenure of council tenants following draft housing proposals announced this week.
The body which represents the organisations managing more than one million council homes across England has strongly objected to the proposals to end the security of council house tenure, on the grounds that this would be extremely harmful to tenants and their estates.
The NFA has called for the Government to instead address the fundamental issues in social housing such as the shortage of supply and the need to reform the benefits system to tackle worklessness amongst housing tenants.
Dennis Rees, Chair of the NFA said:
“The NFA is totally opposed to any removal of secure tenancies in council housing and as a council house tenant all my life I strongly object to the stigmitisation of council housing by labeling them ‘subsidised housing’. The obsession with owner occupation continues to drive Government policy and we need to develop a system where council housing is a tenure of choice and not a last resort for a temporary period.”

“The draft proposals fundamentally fail to address the real issue in social housing which is the need for greater housing supply; reducing security does not deliver that.”

Since the first ALMOs went live in 2002, more than 220,000 homes have been made Decent and the programme has been highly successful in giving residents back pride in their homes and communities and encouraging them to be more actively involved in the management of council housing.

However the NFA has argued that if tenants feel that they have no long term future on estates then it will be impossible to sustain communities and to continue with many regeneration schemes.

Linking tenure with entering employment will also be counter-productive and could potentially risk deterring residents from bettering themselves because of the fear they may lose their homes.

One of the NFA’s key objections to the proposals is the prohibitively high cost of managing the increased turnover of tenancies the measures would create. This would squander precious resources and funding that could be better invested in managing and improving estates.

The National Federation of ALMOs represents and promotes the ALMO option in council housing management. There are 69 live ALMOs managing over one million council homes across England, more than half of the total stock.