The chief executive of the charity Empty Homes says it is "appalling" local authorities are looking to knock down council houses as a way of dodging debt before they go self financing. Nottingham city council have identified nearly 1000, and Birmingham over 1200 homes that they have lined up for demolition. The tenants will be evicted and presumably put into temporary accommodation. What could possibly justify this huge upheaval of people and such a big loss of affordable homes? The shocking answer is - accounting reasons! The government has decided to allocate its own housing debt to councils as part of the scrapping of the HRA subsidy system. The unintended consequence is that councils are seeking to avoid the debt by demolishing houses. Each council house they own will attract around £12,000 of debt. Get rid of a 1000 houses and you avoid £12m debt. Read more on the Empty Homes website.
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