§ THE PRIME MINISTER,pursuant to his reply to the right hon. Member for Huyton (Mr. Harold Wilson), OFFICIAL. REPORT, 25th July, 1972, cols. 1529–31, supplied the following text:
10, Downing Street,
Whitehall,
Dear Harold,
In answer to Supplementary Questions from you on 20th July I undertook to let you have estimates of the extent to which council and private tenants will be affected over the next 12 months by rent increases or rebates as a result of the Housing Finance Bill.
There are about 8 million tenants in England and Wales. The Bill will not alter the rent which about 4¼ million tenants will meet from their own resources over the next 12 months either because they are receiving Supplementary Benefit, or because they are private tenants in categories not affected by the Bill during this period. The other 3¾ million tenants are expected to be broadly affected as follows:
- (1) In October, 1972 about 1 million council tenants who do not qualify for a rebate are estimated to pay an extra £1 a week, and about ½ million are estimated to pay (on average) an extra 60p a week.
- (2)In October 1972 about ½ million council tenants are estimated to qualify for a rebate which, on average, might reduce the rent paid, after the October, 1972 increase, by 30–50p a week.
- (3) In April, 1973 about 1¼ million council tenants who do not qualify for a rebate are estimated to pay an extra 40p a week (on average) and rather more than ¼ million council tenants who qualify for a rebate are estimated to pay an extra 15p a week.
- (4) After January, 1973 about 60,000 private controlled tenants passing into rent
53 regulation are expected to have their rent increased by an average of 70p a week. - (5) In January, 1973 about 200,000 private regulated and controlled tenancies are estimated to qualify for a rent allowance which might reduce the rent met by them by an average of about £1.50 a week
As you know, those tenants who will be required to pay an extra £1 a week in October will normally not have had a rent increase for 18 months or more nor will they be subject to a further increase for 12 months thereafter
These figures cover England and Wales: the position in Scotland is different because the maximum average increase in weekly rents this year is 75p rather than El and because council house rents in Scotland are moving to pooled historic rents, not fair rents
Because of all this and because, as I explained in my answers in the House, the amount and percentage of any rent increase or decrease depends on individual and local circumstances, any national average figure must be very uncertain and perhaps misleading. However, the best estimate we have been able to make is that over the next 12 months the net average effect of the two Bills might be to increase total rents in Great Britain by about 7½ per cent.
Yours sincerely,
Edward Heath
The Right Hon. Harold Wilson. O. B.E., F.R.S., M P