Camden News: Council Homes | Chris Naylor

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Camden News - by RICHARD OSLEY and TOM FOOT
Published: 19 February 2009

2a Goldhurst Terrace, NW6

‘Chink of light’ in housing crisis but sale of properties continues

Lib Dems hopeful of a breakthrough in negotiations with government

FIVE more council homes are to be sold off to private bidders at auction on Monday as the Town Hall’s home-selling programme gathers pace.
The sale is the latest bid to raise money to pay for repairs to the rest of Camden’s housing stock in the absence of traditional investment from the government.
It has proven a much-maligned method of finding funds for repairs because the sales have caused the council’s portfolio of cheap homes to shrink while tens of thousands of people are stranded in overcrowded flats or stuck on the massive waiting list for help.
In a rare moment of optimism, the Town Hall’s Liberal Democrat housing chief, Councillor Chris Naylor, said he could see “a chink of light in the tunnel” in reference to the deadlocked negotiations with the government.
Ministers have frozen cash meant for Camden’s estates for five years because tenants refused to let management of their council homes be privatised.
Cllr Naylor said: “To be honest, this government is so desperate to get the housing industry moving again, we might just be able to get somewhere.”
It is the first sign that the council is beginning to sense that the shifting economic conditions and attitudes at Whitehall might work in Camden’s favour.
Cllr Naylor added: “At long last there feels as if there is a chink of light and we will have to push at that.”
Any help will come too late to save the five homes listed for sale on Monday from falling into private hands. Opponents to the sale argue they should be withdrawn, refurbished if needed and offered to people on the waiting list.
Cllr Naylor said: “We are selecting specific empty properties – as much as we would rather not. We are still pushing the issue with the government and if we could find a way of reaching decent home standards without having to sell properties, we would leap at it.”
Among the homes up for grabs at the sale in Piccadilly is a gothic-style cemetery keeper’s cottage at the St Pancras Cemetery in East Finchley – expected to fetch in the region of £235,000.
Other council-owned lots include:
• a two-bedroom flat in Penhurst Crescent, Kentish Town;
• a garden maisonette in Goldhurst Terrace, West Hampstead;
• a ground floor flat in Iverson Road, West Hampstead.
Critics of council strategy argue there should be a freeze on property sales and energy should be put into lobbying housing minister Margaret Beckett for funds.
Alan Walter, the tenants’ leader in Kentish Town who has helped orchestrate a campaign for direct investment, said: “The total failure of the private housing market reinforces our arguments that investment in first class council housing makes sense.
“But whilst the Prime Minister and Housing Minister Margaret Beckett are making positive noises government is also, with the support of councils like Camden, continuing to drive privatisation schemes and the sale of council homes and land.”
Mr Walter will be among tenants from Camden at Parliament on Wednesday giving evidence about the funding row to the House of Commons Council Housing Group.

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