§ "With permission, Mr. Speaker, I wish to make a Statement concerning intervention under the right to buy provisions of the Housing Act 1980.
§ "On 21st February last year during the Standing Committee proceedings on the Housing Bill I gave an assurance that the Government would take the necessary administrative steps to indicate to a local authority when we were contemplating serving a notice of intervention under what is now Section 23 of the Act. That section gives the Secretary of State power to intervene where it appears to him that tenants have or may have difficulty in exercising the right to buy effectively and expeditiously.
§ "The right to buy provisions of the Housing Act commenced on 3rd October last year. They have therefore now been in force for more than six months. That is an appreciable period in which progress in implementing the right to buy can be demonstrated, or not.
§ "It is quite evident that in certain authorities there has been very little progress. On 4th March and 1st April I named in the House 27 authorities with which we had taken up formally their progress in implementing the right to buy. We have since obtained further information from them all.
§ "We are not satisfied with many of the replies we have received, and further evidence of progress is being sought from these and other authorities. However in the case of seven authorities, it appears already that the rate of progress is so unsatisfactory that intervention under Section 23 would be justified.
§ "In accordance with the assurance I gave during the passage of the Bill, letters are therefore being sent today to the seven authorities concerned stating that the Secretary of State is contemplating serving a notice of intervention on them.
§ "The letters ask the authorities to provide by Wednesday 13th May further information on their current and estimated future progress with implementing the right to buy.
§ "If at that point, it appears that the tenants of any of these authorities have or may have difficulty in exercising the right to buy effectively and expeditiously a notice of intervention will be served under Section 23 of the Act.
§ "The authorities concerned are as follows: Barking and Dagenham; Camden; Greenwich; Newham; Sheffield; Stoke on Trent; and Wolverhampton.
§ "The rights of council tenants to buy their homes are legal rights granted by Parliament. The Government will take what steps are necessary to see that those legal rights are upheld".