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Sector leaders call for next government to scrap high-value asset levy
Housing leaders have called on the next government to scrap the high-value asset levy for councils ahead of the publication of political manifestos.
The high-value asset levy was brought into law as part of the Housing and Planning Act last year. Under the policy, councils will have to pay an annual levy to the Treasury to fund the Voluntary Right to Buy for housing associations.
Council housing representatives including the Association of Retained Council Housing (ARCH), the Local Government Association and the National Federation of Arm’s-Length Management Organisations (NFA) have campaigned against the levy because they say it will force councils to sell off already scarce council housing.
The levy has already been pushed back by a year. It was meant to be introduced from April 2017 but housing minister Gavin Barwell recently revealed councils would not have to make a payment in this financial year.
When grilled on the policy in an Inside Housing interview last month, Mr Barwell said he hoped to mitigate the policy but added the 2015 manifesto was “very explicit that [Right to Buy] should be paid for by the sale of high-value assets”.
John Bibby, chief executive of ARCH, said: “It really is unfair to pay for the extension of the Right to Buy for housing associations by levying local authorities and we’d certainly be pleased to see a decision by any government to abolish the plans for the levy.”
Eamon McGoldrick, managing director of the NFA, said the policy “takes away councils’ freedom to decide how to make best use of their own assets” and “such forced sales present a significant risk to long-term business planning and will undoubtedly reduce the number of homes that councils are planning to build in the future”.
Labour and the Liberal Democrats have both pledged to scrap the high-value asset levy. Tim Farron, leader of the Liberal Democrats, said: “There is a desperate lack of affordable homes for those who need them and it is reckless to force councils to sell off these much-needed homes.”
John Healey, shadow secretary of state for housing, said: “Ministers should drop this extreme plan to force the sell-off of council homes, which will make it much harder to provide the mix of good homes that the country needs.”
