Morning Briefing: Labour pledges to scrap social rent conversion policy

In the news

Labour has pledged to reverse a coalition-era policy which forces social landlords to convert social rented homes into affordable rented, The Independent reports.

New analysis revealed more than 100,000 social rented homes have been converted into more expensive rents in the past six years.

The party said it would scrap the policy introduced by the Conservative-Lib Dem coalition government in 2012 which forces housing associations and local councils to raise rents by an average of 40% by converting social homes into ‘affordable homes’.

Property companies have made millions of pounds by buying land from the Ministry of Defence and applying for planning permission, before selling on the sites, The Guardian reports.

In several cases, no building occurred before the resale; on other sites, no development at all has occurred years after the original sale. In most cases, the MoD failed to ensure that any of the windfall profits were returned to the taxpayer.

In an interview with The Guardian over the weekend, homelessness minister Heather Wheeler said she didn’t know why the number of people sleeping rough has increased in recent years.

Ms Wheeler said she did not accept the suggestion that welfare reforms and council cuts had contributed to the rise.

Lewisham Council has lost £42.4m in housing zone funding from the mayor of London because it was not able to use the funding within the expected timeframe, local newspaper News Shopper reports.

Leeds is the latest council to call for more funding to help cover the cost of its new duties through the Homelessness Reduction Act, which comes into force next month.

The Yorkshire Evening Post reports that the council expects costs to rise by £1.6m, but government funding will cover less than half of that.

London councils have already warned the government funds will not cover the increased workload they will face, because they are now expected under law to give support to all people facing homelessness and carry out more reviews of decisions if a person is turned down for accommodation.

And smoke alarms are to be made mandatory for all homes in Scotland, the BBC reports.

In the wake of the Grenfell Tower fire the Scottish Government will change the law so that all housing must have ceiling-mounted smoke and heat alarms, not just new builds and private rented housing as is currently requirement.