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Council approves housing associations' merger plans
North East Lincolnshire Council has given the go-ahead for a 12,700-home merger between two housing associations.
The council’s cabinet agreed at a specially arranged meeting last week to provisionally approve the joining of Shoreline Housing Partnership and Boston Mayflower.
Shoreline took on social housing stock from the council in 2005, and currently owns and manages almost 8,000 such homes across north-east Lincolnshire. The council effectively had the power to veto any merger because under the transfer it had 40% voting power at member level on Shoreline’s board – and the resolution to merge required a 75% majority vote.
A consultation with Shoreline’s tenants closed earlier this month. Council papers show just 2.2% of tenants responded to consultation on the plans. This meant 1.4% of tenants stated they were in favour of the merger, with 0.5% against and 0.2% neutral.
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Boston Mayflower, formed in 1999, owns almost 5,000 homes to the south of the county.
Shoreline independent advisor to the board Tony Bramley said today: “We are delighted that the council has provided us with conditional approval to merge.
“We will continue to work closely with them to create an agreement that benefits both partners and the people of North East Lincolnshire.”
The merger could complete by the end of this year. It is still subject to a formal agreement being reached between Shoreline and the council.
