Kentish Gazette Canterbury & District
Labour group urges council to take bold housing action
Call for rent caps and investment in new homes
The urgent need for more social housing in the district must be tackled by the city council.
That was the message in a petition to the authority that calls for more homes to be built as part of a radical shake-up of the local housing strategy.
It was delivered days before the members of the planning committee approved the building of a block of eight new council flats in Warwick Road, Canterbury.
But with more than 1,700 people on its housing needs register, the local Labour group says the authority needs to do more.
The Herne Bay group presented the petition to the full council on Thursday. It has 119 signatures collected from the group’s Saturday morning stall in November.
Party member Tom Mellish told councillors: “We have people desperate for housing, and many paying high rents for unsuitable accommodation.
“We call on the council to do all in its power to support the building of council housing and to ensure that new ‘affordable’ homes are realistically priced.
“We also call on them to further support policies that restrict private landlords from imposing high rents to all privately rented accommodation”
Mr Mellish said it was clear the housing market was failing the needs of the people of Canterbury and that affordable housing was only part of the answer.
“Canterbury City Council needs to play a central role in the building and provision of council or social housing at affordable rents,” he said.
“To help finance a radical housebuilding programme, the council should take advantage of the changes to the council tax cap and the 100% retention of business rates.”
Speaking after the meeting, council leader Simon Cook insisted that providing more council homes was a priority of the authority.
“Behind the scenes we have already been providing quite a bit more council housing – not by building but through buying back properties into our stock.
“But we want to build more and have got to find a way of doing it, although I am very encouraged by what the government is now saying and we now have a new ministry for housing. We want to be able to take full advantage of that in Canterbury.
“It doesn’t have to be a vast new council estate, but we can look for brownfield sites where we could build small numbers.
“We have money in our housing revenue account and the removing of the cap on rents, and I’d like to think the government will also lift the cap on borrowing, which will help us plan for the future.”