§ Mr. Home Robertsonasked the Secretary of State for Scotland (1) how many council houses have been sold in Scotland since the Tenants' Rights, Etc. (Scotland) Act came into force; what is the gross value of those houses; what price was actually paid by the purchasers; and what proportion of the gross value has been made available to local housing authorities to spend on capital projects;
(2) what is the average sum in Scotland per dwelling sold available for investment in house building or rehabilitation by local authorities as a result of their sale
404Wof council houses, allowing for the average discount, the 50 per cent. of the sale price which goes to central Government and the extent to which council house purchasers take up council mortgages; and what percentage this represents of the original total valuation.
§ Mr. RifkindThe latest available information, based on a survey last month of all Scottish local authorities, is that about 3,100 sales under the Tenants' Rights, Etc. (Scotland) Act 1980 have already been concluded. About 16,500 applications to purchase under the Act are currently in progress. Substantial numbers of voluntary sales have also been concluded since October 1980 as well as sales in the new towns and to tenants of the Scottish Special Housing Association.
The latest available information on the gross value and purchase price of houses sold both under the right to buy and voluntary arrangements in the period October 1980 to March 1981 is that the average gross value of houses sold was £13,600 and the average price paid was £7,500. In the same period the main source of finance for approximately 36 per cent. of all local authority house sales was a loan from the local authority.
The hon. Member's references to the use of income from sales relate to arrangements obtaining south of the border. Under the present Scottish system, the benefit to authorities from sales is that the gross resources available to them for capital expenditure on housing take account of estimated net capital receipts from sales. The Government have been able to include more than £20 million in local authorities' allocations this year which could not have been made available had we not been able to foresee net capital receipts from sales of at least that amount. The Government are anxious to give authorities individually greater flexibility in the use of the capital receipts accruing to them from sales and we are considering with them possible changes to the capital allocation system for the next financial year.