Document drafts plans for transfer of housing

It will form the basis of a publication to be sent out to tenants telling them what they can expect from their new landlords if the transfer goes ahead in a year's time.

But opponents of the scheme today condemned its contents as "loaded and biased".

Public consultation on the massive document will be the prelude to a ballot next March, involving all tenants, who have a legal right to make the decision on the future of their homes.

If the proposal goes ahead it will bring about the biggest transfer so far by any local authority.

Tory and Liberal Democrats councillors say it needs £170 million over the next five years to bring homes up to modern standards and the transfer is the only way it can be afforded.

They want to set up community housing trusts which they say could draw funds from the Government-backed Housing Corporation and other sources not open to the Council.

But the district's Defend Council Houses campaign has accused the authority of failing to examine all options.

It claims that tenants will lose their rights and the Council will be unable to carry out its legal obligation to house the homeless.

The Council, however, says tenants would have better houses, benefits and a five year guarantee of rent levels.

The draft document is expected to meet a stormy passage as it goes to the Executive Committee meeting then the full Council next Tuesday.

The Council's executive member for health and housing Councillor Kris Hopkins said: "We believe that transferring to a not-for-profit landlord is the only way we will be to attract the level of funding we would need to bring the district's housing up to an acceptable standard over the coming years.

"We are committed to giving tenants all the facts they need about the transfer and what it would actually mean to them and this document will provide a key part in providing this."

But Councillor Dave Green (Lab, Odsal) said: "This document is making promises on behalf of a body which does not yet exist."

He pointed out that while tenants would retain a right to buy their council houses, the price would reflect improvements over the past ten years - instead of five.

Ann Morgan, of the Defend Council Houses campaign, claimed the transfer would mean tenants could be evicted in 17 ways which were not included on the document.

If the tenants agree to a transfer their homes would be transferred to Bradford Community Housing Trust Ltd which in turn would switch them to North Bradford, East Bradford, South Bradford, Bradford West, Aire-Wharfe and Shipley Community Housing Trusts.

The deal which is likely to be offered to tenants if councillors agree includes:

a five year guarantee that rents will not rise above inflation. Service charges would be paid separately and would only be the actual cost of the provision. Housing benefit would continue to be paid by the Council to people who were entitled to it;

eight tenants, two councillors and five independent people serving on the boards of the local trusts;

the trusts supporting and funding tenant and resident associations;

tenants losing the right to manage their properties and the opportunity to transfer rents to mortgages;

the trusts would be expected to spend £175 million on houses in the first five years and more than £900 million over the next 30 years;

properties involved in possession orders would not be transferred;

strict behaviour rules - including a ban on signs encouraging hatred and tenants being responsible for the behaviour of their visitors - would continue to be part of tenancy agreements;

tenants would have to keep noise down between 11.30pm and 7am;

families who break the tenancy agreements would continue to face eviction.

Today Mike Stocks, chairman of the Community Association for the Regeneration of Estates, said: "We don't think there should be just bricks and mortar improvements, there should also be social and economic regeneration."