Sector critical of pre-Budget report actions

The umbrella organisation wanted to see the chancellor Alistair Darling back a programme of making 250,000 social homes more environmentally-friendly.

NHF chief executive David Orr said: ‘We’re very disappointed that the chancellor failed to adopt our proposed programme of greening thousands of the nation’s social homes, which would have slashed carbon emissions, reduced energy bills for the less well-off, created nearly 100,000 jobs and supported the economic recovery.

‘We cautiously welcome the boost for some low carbon projects and renewable energy – but we will need reassurance that lower income households will benefit from the schemes as well as those from more affluent backgrounds who can afford to pay for domestic green technologies upfront.’

The Chartered Institute of Housing saw the pre-Budget report announcements as a clear indication that housing funding would continue to be squeezed.

It was pleased the government decided to maintain high levels of public borrowing until the end of 2011 but did not agree with ending the stamp duty holiday at the end of the year, which it says has helped 240,000 new homeowners.

Sarah Webb, CIH chief executive, said: ‘There are some helpful measures and we should recognise government efforts and success to stabilise the housing market. 

‘The reduction of 6.1 per cent to 3.1 per cent for average rent increases in 2010/11 for local authority tenants will also make a difference to millions of people.

‘However, there are now some real dangers that the recession will derail the excellent progress we were making to improve housing policy in key areas.’

Nick Jopling, head of residential at real estate firm CB Richard Ellis, called the end of the stamp duty holiday a ‘poke in the eye’ to first-time buyers.

‘An extension to the stamp duty holiday would have been welcome, particularly as the capital receipt for the government equates to £500 per property from those who can least afford it,’ he said.

Homelessness charities welcomed the decision to delay plans to claw back £15 excess payments paid through the local housing allowance.

Chief executive of Crisis, Leslie Morphy, said: ‘It is vital the government now brings forward real proposals for wider reform to the housing benefit system to ensure that it really supports the transition to work, that work always pays and to promote housing stability.’

Gordon MacRae, head of external relations for Shelter Scotland, said: ‘Over the last few months there’s been two ways to increase housing investment in 2010. The first was a plea to the UK chancellor to accelerate capital investment from future years. On first reading, this appears to have fallen on deaf ears.

‘We are now back to looking at the second option, which is to allocate more of the Scottish Budget for next year into affordable homes.’

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