One result of the Local Government and Housing Bill will be to handicap local authorities wishing to invest capital in rebuilding infrastructure and enabling development, says the Royal Town Planning Institute in a letter to the Housing Minister, Lord Caithness.
In particular, the RTPI fears that the provision of affordable housing, through the legitimate use of barter and partnership between the public and private sectors, will be axed as a result of a clampdown on “creative accounting”.
Government policy should be opening up access for those with lower incomes and for dependent people, the RTPI believes. Cities such as London are in danger of economic under-performance because there are shortages of less skilled labour arising from difficulties in finding housing. Some element of housing at affordable rents is needed in the regeneration process.
There are numerous examples of partnership between local authorities and combinations of the private sector and housing associations which have achieved ranges of housing on demanding inner-city sites, the RTPI points out.
“Often this has involved barter and some ingenuity in land assembly and in financing those developments. There is a world of difference between the entrepreneurial spirit shown in such partnership arrangements and accounting devices designed to manipulate town hall finances.”
