Chancellor urged to stand up to Europe on affordable housing
The UK’s housing associations have urged the Chancellor to oppose a European ruling, which it claims will damage the social housing sector.
Representatives of housing associations in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland warn the Chancellor: “Onerous new European regulations will frustrate efforts to boost affordable housing supply through efficiency gains in the sector.”
The dispute revolves around EU procurement rules that oblige organisations to put service contracts out for tender across the whole EU.
In 2001 the European Commission decided that housing associations, which are registered social landlords under the 1996 Housing Act, were also considered bodies governed by public law.
The ruling would require UK housing associations to accept EU procurement legislation, which the housing group claims would be extremely damaging.
They argue that it would: “Divert investment earmarked for social housing into costly and unnecessary bureaucratic activities for no additional benefit; threaten local job creation strategies by preventing targeted investment in local areas; frustrate the Government’s efficiency agenda for the sector; and undermine the independent status of the housing association sector.”
Gordon Brown is being urged to continue fighting against the ruling and launch a case in the European Court of Justice if necessary.
Together the four housing associations provide affordable housing for more than three million people across the UK.
The National Housing Federation claim they have raised £27,000 million since 1989, none of which is part of the Public Sector Borrowing Requirement (PSBR), and “any change to the status of housing associations could affect their ability to raise investment and jeopardise numerous strands of the Government’s housing policy.”
Its chair, Richard Clark, said: “The only possible outcome of this decision is that time and money which could have been used to provide better homes and services for residents will instead now be spent filling out forms for Brussels.”
Tackling the shortage of affordable housing, particularly in London and the South East is one of the major challenges for this government, with experts estimating that hundreds of thousands of new homes are needed if key workers are to continue to live in the South East.
