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Swindon given £1.7m for new council homes

12:50pm Tuesday 12th January 2010 in News

THE first UK council house building programme in two decades will provide 40 new homes in Swindon, the Government announced yesterday.

Unveiling the winners of the second round of funding to help local authorities build new homes over the next year or so, Housing Minister John Healey said Swindon Council would receive £1.7m to support the construction of 25 homes in Marlowe Avenue, Walcot, and two in Beech Avenue, Pinehurst.

It followed the announcement, last September, that the council would receive almost £780,000 under the first round of funding to support the construction of a further 13 new homes on a separate site.

Meanwhile, it was revealed that Wiltshire Council will receive £1.1m for 17 new homes in Southview, Bradford-on-Avon – on top of the £3.1m it was allocated for 47 homes across four sites last autumn.

However, the move – designed to help local authorities address a critical shortage of affordable housing – represented a drop in the ocean when set against the thousands of families languishing on housing waiting lists in the county.

Across England, the Government said it was giving £122m to 73 councils to support a further 1,930 new council homes. Local authorities are expected to match the central funding with similar investments of their own. The announcement brought the total amount allocated by Government since last autumn to more than £260m and the number of new homes backed to 4,104 – making it the “biggest council house building programme in two decades”, according to Mr Healey.

As a condition for receiving funding, councils have had to promise to put in place apprenticeship and job schemes. It is hoped the new schemes will create 7,500 jobs and 100 apprenticeship places across the country.

Comments(32)

Sparky99 says...
1:17pm Tue 12 Jan 10

The two in Beech Avenue are to replace the two which we demolished to allow access to builders for the Academy. (where at least one family was forcibly evicted).
This just seems wrong. Surely those houses should be replaced from the £30m SBC got for the school and the two houses built elsewhere. SBC seem to be pocketing cash somewhere and saving on building two homes.
Of course the Adver could have investigated this. But that would involve journalism.

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politicrat says...
1:43pm Tue 12 Jan 10

timely news :-)
Electioneering pure and simple, wait for more fantastic news for Swindon coming in the next few months from our worried labour MPs seating in Westminster.

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Captain Sensible says...
1:49pm Tue 12 Jan 10

Rather than build new ones why not refurbish the existing ones to a live-inable standard, my girlfriends house in Highworth is a disgrace, the electrics a deathtrap and the place is in a general state of poor repair, yet despite numerous calls to the council nothing ever gets done. I wouldnt mind if they'd give her the money then she could organise it herself. The more dealings you have with SC the more you realise how you wouldnt ask them to run a bath.
.
And when can we expect the dustcarts and dustmen to come out of Winter hibernation? I've not had a collection for weeks, yeah theres some snow on the ground, but that hasnt stopped large delivery lorries making it down my road in Highworth.Pull your finger out you useless incompetant bunch of self serving pillocks!

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Mr Blackwell says...
1:49pm Tue 12 Jan 10

Well, that'll be around 80 more votes for Labour in Swindon then.
.
Just what Swindon needs, our council estates made even larger.

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snoopers says...
2:11pm Tue 12 Jan 10

Agree Mr Blackwell - more chavs made comfortable.

Lets just hope though that this money is spent on building these houses and not put into the council's hands. Be very suspicious indeed if there is another big party - hey, they'll probably spend it on refurbishing their offices so they can enjoy their free wifi in comfort.

priceless code today - club-poor

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snoopers says...
2:22pm Tue 12 Jan 10

The keys are handed over neatley wrapped in a housing benefit form.

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gonefishin says...
2:32pm Tue 12 Jan 10

We should all pay much more council tax so that Captain Sensible's girlfriend's house can be redecorated and 'done up' to her doubtless exacting requirements. After all, it's not Captain Sensible's responsibility to spend a few quid on paint and wallpaper for his bird's council house, and clearly it's not her responsibility either. No, we should pay for it all, so the two of them can spend the rest of their lives together worrying about nothing more troublesome than how fat their 'arrises will become from sitting on them all day doing sweet FA.

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Support_British_Manufacturing says...
2:33pm Tue 12 Jan 10

Not all council tennants are on the take.

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Captain Sensible says...
2:37pm Tue 12 Jan 10

No not at all, she's a tennant, as landlord SBC is responsible for the maintenance of the house structure, as would any landlord be. If she was to do these things herself, she would be in breach of her tennancy agreement, its not a case of spending more council tax money, its already in the pot, its just not used, and SBC is too disorganised to know what it is doing.

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Casual Observer says...
2:39pm Tue 12 Jan 10

Support_British_Manu
facturing wrote:
Not all council tennants are on the take.
Exactly right - many, probably most, are very decent people.

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Sparky99 says...
2:48pm Tue 12 Jan 10

Well, if the Tories hadn't sold off half of the council houses in the first place.....

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gonefishin says...
2:55pm Tue 12 Jan 10

My apologies then to Captain Sensible and his girlfriend.

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Grimwald says...
3:02pm Tue 12 Jan 10

Is the contract to be awarded to the new Swindon Commercial Services Ltd? It would be a nice start for them.

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mrsdoubtfire says...
3:30pm Tue 12 Jan 10

You get chavs and benefit scroungers in private accommodation too. Would be nice to think these properties will go to deserving families but I doubt it

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AndyJH says...
3:32pm Tue 12 Jan 10

At last Swindon tenants are getting some of the money back that “Blue Labour” have taken from the housing revenue pot over the last decade.

If Swindon had been allowed to keep its rent revenue then EVERY council house in Swindon could have been refurbished up to a decent standard and hundreds of new social housing homes could have been built at ZERO cost to tax payers.

This council rents to government was just another stealth tax con by a failing Blue Labour government.

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Al Smith says...
3:35pm Tue 12 Jan 10

Support_British_Manu
facturing wrote:
Not all council tennants are on the take.
Spot on!
-
The original point of Council Housing was that people in poorly paid jobs could have secure and decent housing and not have to deal with private slumlords. That is as true today as it was 50 or 100 years ago.
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A couple working on minimum wage might have a take home pay of £15k and won't be able to afford to buy a house so have no choice but to rent.
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So I'm all for the building of new council houses but they should only be for those who work (and elderly and disabled) - NO dole scroungers.
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However, this £1.7million is nothing but a cynical pre-election vote winner. If Brown really did care about affordable housing he wouldn't of gone around during the last election boasting about unaffordable housing was (or to put it his way how much richer people had become because house prices had doubled). Brown is now just firefighting to stop the core Labour vote from defecting to the BNP (hence this and the free laptops plan that was in the news yesterday).

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Captain Sensible says...
3:44pm Tue 12 Jan 10

There are an awful lot of decent people who do vital but low paid jobs in this country who have no chance of ever being able to afford their own houses, its for these people that council houses existed and still exist. Its to give them a secure roof over their heads, its not their fault that this governent hands out these houses willy nilly to sponging immigrants or scummy chavs. Decent people are on the waiting list whilst these people are placed at the front of the queue, the countries gone mad.

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Donkey says...
4:27pm Tue 12 Jan 10

There'd be a lot more on even lower pay if the Labour Government had not introduced an escalating minimum wage, which the Tories were totally against.

Toatally agree that working tenants should have preference over non-working/no intention of working, baby-farming couples, who create children for an easy life. Of course, local fourth or fifth generation Swindonians would be hard to find, I guess?

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Captain Sensible says...
4:38pm Tue 12 Jan 10

Yes Donkey, but its not much use when the government then lets in thousands of immigrants willing to work for less than the minimum wage to put all the low paid British workers out of work.
.
At times getting the No7 bus out through South Marston is like travelling on public transport in Warsaw, or Goa, not an English voice to be heard.

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who dat? says...
5:10pm Tue 12 Jan 10

Spot on, Captain- and this policy comes from the very top -or bottom- of our "government!!

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itsamess says...
6:20pm Tue 12 Jan 10

You have all failed to notice this money is conditional on aprenticeships and jobs--another boost to the public sector jobs which under labour has risen from under 1 mill to over 6 mill with all the benefits to go with it. We all know any houses built will go to mostly immigrant families living in overcrowded accomodation just to get housing--isnt it time our people came first?

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Bobfm says...
6:49pm Tue 12 Jan 10

itsamess, is of course right this will end up been a net loss for SBC, exactly like the 'free' swimming places fiasco.

We will see much more of this for Swindon, don't forget the laptops, as Anne Snelgrove is Gordon Browns PPS or similar.

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faatmaan says...
9:43pm Tue 12 Jan 10

too little too late, all the council desires are the extra 40k homes for people who can't afford them. Perhaps if their was a rule that at least 40% of homes built were for low cost or low rent the situation may improve and offer people a real chance to live under a roof and not be a slave to debt as the developers/council would like to see, hopefully this would also force down the price of other property with a massive oversupply situation, and this would hopefully mean negligent landlords would have to upgrade their shoddy hovels to a good standard so as to attract tenants whether they be public or private.Remember for most people a home is a place to live in , not a way of getting rich quick.

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josiefrench says...
11:48pm Tue 12 Jan 10

Fact.....Very few migrant workers qualify for any housing support. In their first year migrants are not entitled to emergency shelter....mostly relying on private rented housing - often overcrowded and in poor condition. Asylum seekers are housed under separate arrangements, funded and run centrally by the Home Office. They do not "Jump the queue". If all immigration from abroad stopped tomorrow the South-West Region would still need all the planned housing growth.

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Casual Observer says...
12:13am Wed 13 Jan 10

josiefrench wrote:
Fact.....Very few migrant workers qualify for any housing support. In their first year migrants are not entitled to emergency shelter....mostly relying on private rented housing - often overcrowded and in poor condition. Asylum seekers are housed under separate arrangements, funded and run centrally by the Home Office. They do not "Jump the queue". If all immigration from abroad stopped tomorrow the South-West Region would still need all the planned housing growth.
Thank you for re-introducing some sanity to the Bob'n'nMessy show.

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itsamess says...
7:52am Wed 13 Jan 10

CO
Back to your mischievious self.

Josiefrench

perhaps you should go to one of the many immigrant advisory centres to see how you will be advised of all the benefits you can get after just 6 weeks--other than that--do explain why and how overcrowding laws do not apply to immigrants--and of course what happens when the council intervenes?

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Casual Observer says...
9:46am Wed 13 Jan 10

"CO
Back to your mischievious self"
 
Moi?

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Bobfm says...
10:09am Wed 13 Jan 10

http://www.parliamen
t.uk/commons/lib/res
earch/briefings/snsp
-04737.pdf

Go to page 9, deals with queue jumping. It doesn't apparently happen, but looking at the statistics in the text, they don't stack up.

60% of migrants live in private rented. So where do the others live, when we read only 11% have social housing.

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itsamess says...
11:25am Wed 13 Jan 10

Many govt orchestrated figures can be very deceiving. I am not sure what the rules are when it comes to property ownership and the electoral roll. As i advertised 2 jobs and had 200+applicants 85% were EU citizens 8 of which used the same address. I did a check and the house--2 bedrooms was foreign owned. It is not hard to see how the system used by the asians to cram many families into small houses and using rents to buy others--what chance do our kids have to buy them.

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The ModFather says...
12:12pm Wed 13 Jan 10

I grew up in a council house, my father worked long hours to pay the rent and keep the family. The family next door did not work and were generally slobbish, with 3 children, no work, all paid for on benefits. Fast forward 15 years, I have built up a successful career in IT, and pay my way. The family that didn’t work next door, well their children are now in there late 20’s / early 30’s, they all have their own kids now, and guess what, they live in council houses and are on benefits without a job between them. Its all about the values you are taught when growing up.

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Mr Blackwell says...
12:15pm Wed 13 Jan 10

Sparky99 wrote:
Well, if the Tories hadn't sold off half of the council houses in the first place.....
Are they all standing empty now then?
.
No, there are still people living in them... so I'm not sure what your point is, other than the Tories gave people the chance to own their own property and, in many cases, make many thousands of pounds out of them that they'd otherwise never have made (all paid for by the taxpayer, as per usual).

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abbotboy says...
3:27pm Sun 17 Jan 10

In reply to the entry from Sparky99, can I remind him of the situation in late 94\95, when the governmnent gave the sbc a £10 million payment for receipts of council house sales, the sbc used the money on a refurbishment of the Brunel Centre, not one extra house was built, they then later sold of the centre and still no houses built, can you tell us how many Labour supporters who living in a council house have bought it and then resold it at vast profits?. perhaps you would like the story of the labour councillor, who worked at Rover, he went around the works urging workers not to sell thier houses as it was not labour policy, months later they found out, that he had sold his and when asked, he told them it was not me, my wife sold it!!.
many people have benefitted from these sales and the house sales have generated movement and the opening up of different life styles. How many houses have Labour built in the last 13 years.......

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