When the homeownership taskforce was launched in February its goal was to find ways to allow Labour to remain the party of homeownership without eroding the low-cost housing base. The taskforce's report (page 11) makes a good stab at reconciling these two demands: it recommends restricting the right to buy while expanding shared ownership, with safety nets should the buyer's financial circumstances change.

Restrictions for curbing abuses of the right to buy have quickly been slotted into the upcoming Housing Bill, so it's a pretty safe bet that the government will also push ahead with bringing discounts in line with those for housing association tenants under the right to acquire. Many will be disappointed that the policy is not to be scrapped altogether.

But the taskforce is proposing eventually to replace the right to buy with an equity loan similar to what's available now under the Starter Home Initative. This would allow tenants to buy their home but would also benefit the state, because in any future sale the stake and a share of the profit would be recouped.

Yet the most radical of the report's 51 proposals are to do with the expansion of shared homeownership, which accounts for more than 20% of Housing Corporation-funded output. The taskforce wants all social housing tenants to be able to buy a stake in their home and to expand the output of shared-ownership schemes by forcing RSLs to recycle their surpluses from "staircasing" back into building more homes – at least if that's the priority of the regional housing strategy. For RSLs, this is yet more nibbling at their independence: many use the surpluses to cross-subsidise mixed-tenure schemes, repairs or community projects.

Ringfencing RSLs’ surpluses is yet more nibbling at their independence

The taskforce argues that without grant in the first place, RSLs wouldn't make the surpluses, so it is the state's money to spend how it sees fit. But that will cut little ice with those whose business plans could be suddenly being blown out of the water.

There is a widely held assumption in some quarters that RSLs are much better off than they make out. It's up to them to show they are not crying wolf. And if the Housing Corporation is to turn recommendation into policy, it must look for ways of phasing it in so the damage to RSLs can be limited.

The women's issue
We make no apologies this week for being overtly sexist. Most of our issue is devoted to women: the problems they face getting to the top in housing; a celebration of those that have got there; the tenants who turned their estates into places where people want to live rather than escape from; and the failure of equal pay laws.

Source

Housing Today