ARCH has signed a
joint letter to the Deputy Prime Minister, Angela Rayner, and
Chancellor Rachel Reeves, calling for a 10-year rent settlement for
councils and housing associations that allows annual increases of
up to CPI + 1% (Consumer Price Index) plus gradual convergence to
'formula' rents that aim to ensure that tenants of similar homes
pay similar rents, regardless of who their landlord is and when
their tenancy started. The letter is also signed by the
Chartered Institute of Housing, National Housing Federation, Local
Government Association, National Federation of ALMOs, Councils with
ALMOs Group and the Northern Housing Consortium. It argues
that these measures, which go beyond the proposal in the
Government's rent consultation paper, are essential to bring
council Housing Revenue Accounts into balance and eventually enable
councils to fund the expansion of new
housebuilding.
An accompanying report, jointly commissioned from Savills
(summary here and
full report here) provides a
detailed analysis of future expenditure needs in support of this
argument.
The same argument was put forward in ARCH's response, submitted jointly with the National
Federation of ALMOs, to the Government's consultation on future
rents, which closed on 23 December.