§ 57. Mr. Joseph Deanasked the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will make a statement on the sale of council houses by local authorities where there is a known and existing housing shortage.
§ Mr. FreesonOur position on the sale of council houses was explained in Circular 70/74. Indiscriminate selling without regard to the local housing situation cannot be justified. A local authority's first duty is to ensure that there is an adequate supply of rented accommodation. There are many people who at present have no choice but to look to local authorities to provide them with a decent home and who cannot aspire to home ownership. I believe that it is entirely wrong that council houses should be sold in areas where the local authority is not wholly satisfied that the needs of these people are fully catered for.
I would hope that local authorities who recognise, as I do, the desire among tenants for home ownership or for a greater say in the management and control of their homes, would consider methods other than selling off their existing stock. Local authorities can build for sale and I want to see more doing so, especially for smaller households. There is also scope for the development of forms of co-operative tenure to provide greater choice, and I am actively 483W studying how further progress towards this might be made.