Council tenants will vote next month on whether their homes will remain under local authority control or be transferred to a new housing association – but there has been a new twist in the saga.
Caerphilly County Borough Council has revealed that it too could match the £173 million needed to upgrade and maintain its 10,980 properties to the Welsh Housing Quality Standard.
Until recently, the council had maintained the only way to get the housing up to scratch was to transfer the stock to a new social landlord to release Government funding, in this case to be called Castell Mynydd.
Labour called for the extra work to be done into the funding, believing the council could match the funding without the transfer.
While the council could not achieve the WHQS until 2019 or 2020, compared to Castell Mynydd’s 2017, it could match its £173 million total spend over the next 30 years.
A spokesman for Caerphilly County Borough said: “Since the Offer Document was agreed, further work on the Council’s financial position has shown that, while it could not achieve the WHQS within the five year period, that is by 2017, it would be able to bring homes up to the WHQS by 2019/20.
“A report that sets out an updated position on how Caerphilly County Borough Council would meet the Welsh Housing Quality Standard (WHQS) is going to the Policy and Resources Scrutiny Committee on Tuesday, October 4.
“The report sets out a business plan that would deliver the WHQS for all the Council’s homes by 2019/20 if tenants vote no in the ballot planned for later this year.
“The council would have a viable business plan that could achieve and maintain WHQS and in addition match all the service improvements in the Offer Document that Castell Mynydd could do by 2019/20 compared with 2017/18 It would also be able to achieve the same total spend as planned by Castell Mynydd over a 30 year period.”
Caerphilly County Borough Council’s proposal to transfer its homes to Castell Mynydd