§ 36. Mr. Prenticeasked the Minister of Housing and Local Government and Minister for Welsh Affairs what recent guidance or advice he has given to local authorities on the maximum income limits permissible for families occupying or wishing to occupy council housing.
§ Mr. H. BrookeNone, Sir. The general management and control of a local authority's houses is, by law, a matter for the authority itself.
§ Mr. PrenticeIs the Minister aware of the great deal of worry and distress which has been caused among council tenants in Croydon by the policy of that council in threatening to evict families Where the joint income of a man and his wife is more than £20 a week and to refuse new tenancies where the joint income is more than £15 a week? Do not the powers of the Minister extend to giving some guidance to councils to prevent them doing this sort of thing? Is he aware that people who have been in a home for 20 or 30 years may lose it and that there are others who cannot get mortgages or obtain homes otherwise and will be refused permission to go on council estates? Can he discourage local authorities from following crazy and reactionary policies of this kind?
§ Mr. BrookeI have frequently expressed my view that the most fruitful approach to this problem is made by local authorities adopting a system of differential rents.
§ Vice-Admiral Hughes HallettIs not it quite wrong for the policy of any local authority, that of Croydon or any other, to be condemned in this House without seeing how that policy is applied?
§ Mr. MitchisonDoes not the right hon. Gentleman agree that whatever the merits or demerits of differential rents, they serve the exact opposite of what Croydon is doing, as Croydon Council is turning people out?
§ Mr. BrookeI think the wise councils are those which adopt systems of differential rents. I am sorry to find that there are still a considerable number of local authorities which are not enlightened enough to do that.