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Combined authority could set up new Housing Revenue Account to boost development, Liverpool mayor says
Liverpool City Region (LCR) mayor Steve Rotheram has suggested the combined authority could set up a new Housing Revenue Account (HRA) to help councils build homes.
Speaking at the Housing Community Summit in Liverpool earlier this week, Mr Rotheram said he had been talking to the government about “how, not whether, we should” build council housing.
He pointed out that it is “difficult” for councils to reopen their HRAs themselves, which means there is an opportunity for the combined authority to step in.
“When the housing stock was handed over through stock transfer, all of our local authorities closed our HRAs and the contingent liabilities within those housing accounts, so none of our councils want to open those,” Mr Rotheram said.
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“What we said is there’s a possibility of the combined authority opening up a new one, and then we can do things on behalf of our local authorities,” he said.
“Plus, the fact is that we have the ability to borrow money at a cheaper rate, and so we can start to get some housing projects off the ground at scale, which include council housing.”
The majority of Liverpool’s council stock was transferred to housing associations in the 1990s and 2000s.
Mr Rotheram was speaking on a panel to discuss how devolution can help unite local authorities and housing associations.
The LCR mayor added that he had recently met chief executives of local housing associations to discuss ways the combined authority can help.
“The one thing that we do need to do is lobby on their behalf,” he said. “If they got a cheap source of investment – for instance, we can borrow, as combined authorities, at cheaper rates than they can through the Public Works Loan Board – that would again enable them to have some certainty about investment.”
“There are other things that they’ve asked us for, so we put all that in the submission as part of our growth plan to national government,” Mr Rotheram added.
On the first day of the conference, Mr Rotheram launched an initiative aimed at “revolutionising the housing sector” by delivering homes with zero energy bills using modern methods of construction.
He has said previously that he would like to see a “big chunk” of the Labour Party’s pledge to complete 1.5 million homes delivered in the area.
In July, Liverpool City Council launched a consultation on its draft housing strategy, committing to nearly doubling the proportion of affordable homes built by 2030 as part of a £1bn building programme.
Speaking on the same panel in Liverpool, Nick Atkin, chief executive of Yorkshire Housing, reiterated his point that because devolution has brought together housing associations, they are able to discuss ways of solving problems with poor-quality Section 106 homes.
“We’re concerned that we’ve been bringing into the affordable housing stock properties that we’re going to have to go back and retrofit within 10 years,” Mr Atkin said.
“The coming-together of all the housing providers has given us an ability to have a conversation and say that we are going to set a standard beneath which none of us will drop, no matter what the price.”
Last week, a cross-party coalition of more than 100 councils also called on the government to bring in a raft of reforms to enable councils to build more housing, including a multimillion-pound cash injection and reforms to Right to Buy.
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