Our Campaign Statement
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"We oppose New Labour's drive to privatise council housing. Decent affordable housing is an essential component of a comprehensive welfare state. Privatisation (stock transfer, PFI schemes, etc) reduces accountability, leads to increased rents, more public money being siphoned off into consultant and management fees, telephone number salaries and profits for the, so called, 'partners' and is 'Bad Value'. We deplore the fact that councils are being prevented (by legal and financial constraints) from adequately maintaining and improving council housing - we demand the government immediately change from PSBR to GGFD to allow councils to borrow at cheap rates of interest. It is accepted that around £20billion is required to clear the backlog of work. In its desperation to pursue privatisation the government is now bribing councils with a budget of £12billion to write off capital debts if they agree to transfer homes. We demand that this £12billion, along with the proceeds of 'Daylight Robbery' and a part of the massive government budget surplus should be made available to enable local authorities to carry out a major programme of council housing improvements for the benefit of tenants and the homeless. We call on council tenants, local authority trade unions and others to unite to defend the future of council housing and oppose privatisation in any form. |