Charity demands tougher right to buy restrictions
Shelter Scotland is calling for the government to end the right to buy for all new tenancies, and impose tougher conditions on existing tenants.
The Scottish Government is proposing to end the right to buy for new tenants, or those returning to social housing. But the charity wants it to go further by restricting the right to buy for existing tenants.
It wants all properties to be subject to the government’s modernised right to buy. This reduces the maximum discount from 60 per cent for houses or 70 per cent for flats to 35 per cent, and increases the eligibility period from two years to five.
‘Right to buy and building more homes is like pouring the bath water out at the same time as running the taps’
Shelter Scotland director Graeme Brown
Modernised right to buy currently applies to tenancies granted since 30 September 2002, with those agreed before that date subject to the less restrictive preserved right to buy.
Shelter Scotland director Graeme Brown said: ‘The right to buy policy has robbed communities of social housing that has often then been sold on the open market for ridiculous prices, particularly at the height of the housing market boom.
‘Right to buy and building more homes is like pouring the bath water out at the same time as running the taps. When Scotland needs more social housing that just makes no sense whatsoever.’
The charity said nearly half a million public sector homes have been sold since the right to buy was introduced more than 25 years ago, while only 42,000 houses have been built.
Shelter Scotland has issued its demands in response to a consultation on the Scottish Government’s new housing bill. It is also calling for immediate action to protect homeowners from repossession.
Mr Brown said: ‘The Scottish Government’s promised new legal protections for Scottish homeowners should be the first thing on the order sheet when the Scottish Parliament returns in two weeks time.
‘Despite many lenders using more tolerant measures to help customers, further action is needed to prevent a second and more devastating wave of repossessions.’
Last week the Council of Mortgage Lenders found the number of mortgage possessions fell in the second quarter of the year; there were 11,400 cases from April to June which was 10 per cent lower than the 12,700 in the first quarter of the year.
But the number in the second quarter of this year was 14 per cent higher than the 10,000 cases in the second quarter of last year.
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Readers' comments (3)
Harry Lime | 18/08/2009 2:01 pm
I agree, generally with the capping of RTB staircases in rural areas, where affordable units are genuinely hard to come by, but I don't agree with a general ruling, and certainly one with caps so low as 60 or 70% many people want to have paid for their properties by the time they retire to remove some financial concerns - having a cap of 60 or 70% could leave a sizeable rental amount that will be carged when people no longer work. Rather than create mixed communities this could cause buyers to leave these products immediately. A limit of 90 or 95% would prevent people ever staircasing and ensure they're perpetual - they could have no succession rights if there are concerns that these units might not be made available to others long term.
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Joe Halewood | 18/08/2009 3:10 pm
No. no, no and no again!!
I do wish anyone can give me any logical reason why tenants (correction social tenants alone) should be entitled to buy the house they rent. It is a stupid immoral and illogical policy. So stop making RTB harder just get rid of it altogether.
Every RTB sale denies another prospective tenants of a roof over their head. It denies choice to the most vulnerable - the reason social housing was and still is used for. Private tenants have no RTB and pay far more in rent. Many there will have been denied a social tenancy because of the 1 millioon RTB sales. So that 1 million have endured higher rents and no rights to buy. If you can afford a RTB mortgage go get a proper one and relinquish your tenancy as u have enjoyed massibe state subsidies for years and all u are doing is profiteering at the expense of some other poor soul
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AC Preston | 19/08/2009 2:09 pm
^^^What he said!
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