Only ‘needy’ will be given council houses

COUNCIL houses in Oldham will now only be rented to residents ‘in need’ – meaning nearly 20,000 people on a waiting list will no longer be considered for a home.

The town hall has agreed to change the way it allocates social housing to try to tackle the housing crisis, which has seen the most desperate struggle to find somewhere to live.

But leaders say they can only do so much with a ‘limited’ turnover of properties, and have called on the government to legislate for a ‘significant programme’ of new council house building.

Previously, half of council homes went to those classed as being most in need, with the other half allocated to people on the housing register who would bid for homes.

But on Monday night the cabinet agreed they could no longer ‘justify’ new tenants on a ‘first come, first served’ basis in the face of growing levels of homelessness.

The town hall revealed that it has had to provide emergency accommodation to nearly 100 homeless households.

In the borough there are around 24,000 people on the housing needs register, but only 5,000 of which are identified as being ‘in need.’

These are groups such as homelesshouseholds, people with a serious medical condition, and high-risk victims of domestic violence.

Cabinet member for housing, Coun Hannah Roberts, told members they are facing a ‘significant increase’ in the demand for social housing.

“We know this is a significant change, we also know that it is still going to leave us with a substantial amount of unmet housing need in the borough and we will be coming forward in our housing strategy for ways that we want to address that.

“But in the meantime we feel that we have to make this change in order to deal with the large numbers of people we have who are in need.”

Councillors voted to approve the proposals.