Agenda item

7.42pm – Councillor Andrew Johnson moved, seconded by Councillor Harry Phibbs, the special motion standing in their names:

“This Council welcomes the decision by the Government to raise the cap on the Right to Buy discount from £16,000 to £75,000 with effect from 2^nd April this year.

That this Council notes that:

·        The Right to Buy has helped thousands of council tenants in H&F to buy their own home since it launched over 30 years ago.

·        Completions under the scheme all but collapsed when the maximum discount in the capital was reduced in 2004 from £38,000 to £16,000, leading to a slump from 245 Right to Buy sales in 2003/04 to 7 in H&F last year.

·        Since the revised discount came into force on 2nd April, a total of 119 new applications have been received by the Council’s HomeBuy unit, with a total of 134 applications currently being processed.

·        That the first launch event of the Right to Buy road show at 145 King Street attracted over 384 residents.

That this Council resolves to:

·        Continue to promote the Right to Buy to all eligible tenants within Hammersmith and Fulham

·        Continue to promote other forms of low-cost home ownership to council tenants and provide them with help in getting onto the property ladder.

·        Continue to lobby the Government to increase the discount in high value residential areas such as Hammersmith & Fulham, to make the discount more meaningful for our tenants.

·        Re-invest a proportion of the receipts received from each sale into the provision of new affordable housing in line with current Government guidance on the use of receipts.”

Speeches on the special motion were made by Councillors Andrew Johnson and Adronie Alford (for the Administration).

Under Standing Order 15(e) (vi), Councillor Lisa Homan moved, seconded by Councillor Stephen Cowan, an amendment to the motion as follows:

“Delete the final bullet point and replace with:

“The Council recognises that London is suffering the consequences of a housing crisis. That means current statistics demonstrate that the average twenty-something will be in their fifties before they get a foot on the property ladder; it means that there are tens of thousands of hard working families struggling with overcrowding and unsuitable housing conditions and it means that homeless levels are increasing. Fixing the supply of genuinely affordable homes to buy and rent is critical.

The Council therefore resolves to:

• Lobby the government to be able to keep and use 100% of the receipts from council home sales for re-investment in building new homes.
• To provide a like-for-like replacement home for each council home sold.
• Guarantees to use its discretion and ensure that rents on replacement homes are set in line with other social rents in the borough - not at 80% of market rate.
• Stop its policy of selling off council homes to property speculators (as featured in the BBC’s Homes Under The Hammer) and in the process banning local residents from renting or even buying those homes to live in.
• Stop its policy of offering property speculators the opportunity to demolish up to a third of the Borough’s current council housing stock
• Recognises its failure to build a single affordable home to rent on recent major property schemes and its failure to build any genuinely affordable homes to buy. The Council therefore resolves to follow the Borough and GLA’s planning guidelines to help increase the supply of genuinely affordable housing to rent or buy.”

Speeches on the amendment were made by Councillors Lisa Homan, Stephen Cowan and PJ Murphy (for the Opposition) and Councillors Harry Phibbs and Andrew Johnson (for the Administration) before it was put to the vote:

FOR                            12

AGAINST                   25

NOT VOTING0

The motion was declared Lost.

Speeches on the substantive motion were then made by Councillors Lisa Homan and Stephen Cowan (for the Opposition) and Nicholas Botterill (for the Administration).

Councillor Andrew Johnson (for the Administration) made a speech winding up the debate before the substantive motion was put to the vote:

FOR                            27

AGAINST                   0

NOT VOTING12

The motion was declared CARRIED.

8.25 pm – RESOLVED:

This Council welcomes the decision by the Government to raise the cap on the Right to Buy discount from £16,000 to £75,000 with effect from 2^nd April this year.

That this Council notes that:

·        The Right to Buy has helped thousands of council tenants in H&F to buy their own home since it launched over 30 years ago.

·        Completions under the scheme all but collapsed when the maximum discount in the capital was reduced in 2004 from £38,000 to £16,000, leading to a slump from 245 Right to Buy sales in 2003/04 to 7 in H&F last year.

·        Since the revised discount came into force on 2nd April, a total of 119 new applications have been received by the Council’s HomeBuy unit, with a total of 134 applications currently being processed.

·        That the first launch event of the Right to Buy road show at 145 King Street attracted over 384 residents.

That this Council resolves to:

·        Continue to promote the Right to Buy to all eligible tenants within Hammersmith and Fulham

·        Continue to promote other forms of low-cost home ownership to council tenants and provide them with help in getting onto the property ladder.

·        Continue to lobby the Government to increase the discount in high value residential areas such as Hammersmith & Fulham, to make the discount more meaningful for our tenants.

·        Re-invest a proportion of the receipts received from each sale into the provision of new affordable housing in line with current Government guidance on the use of receipts.