Local Authority Tenants (Hansard, 8 February 1994)

§ Mr. Bayley
To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will list the companies commissioned in 1992–93 by his Department to carry out polling and market research of the views of council tenants; and if he will list the areas of research, the questionnaires used and report the results of the research.

§ Sir George Young
No companies were specifically commissioned to do so in 1992–93, but a number of the continuous general surveys carried out by the Office of Population Censuses and Surveys, which provide housing information for my Department, include council tenants in the sample. Examples of these are:
The Survey of English Housing;

The Family Expenditure Survey;

The Omnibus Survey;

The General Household Survey.
All my Department's published research reports are placed in the House of Commons Library. Among those published in 1993 dealing with local authority housing are:
Crime Prevention on Council Estates;

Priority Estates Project Costs Effectiveness Study: Summary of Findings;

An Evaluation of Estate Based Housing Management;

An Evaluation of the First Year Experience of the Local Authority Reports to Tenants Regime.

§ Mr. Bayley
To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what proportion of local authority tenants received a personal copy of an annual report about standards of local authority housing management performance in 1992–93.

§ Sir George Young
Section 167 of the Local Government and Housing Act 1989 requires local authorities to send every tenant an annual report on their housing management performance.

§ Mr. Bayley
To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what proportion of local authority tenants had at July 1993 transferred to housing action trusts.

§ Sir George Young
Figures are not available for the number of tenants that have transferred to housing action trusts. However, the proportion of local authority dwellings which had transferred to housing action trusts at July 1993 was about 0.1 per cent.

§ Mr. Bayley
To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what percentage of council house tenants had transferred their tenancy to a new landlord at July 1993.

§ Sir George Young
Between April 1988 and July 1993 nearly 119,000 dwellings were transferred out of local authority ownership as a result of large-scale transfers—LSVTs—tenants' choice and small-scale transfers. This represents about 2.75 per cent. of the council stock at 1 April 1988. A further 3,500 dwellings have transferred since July and another 25,000 should transfer by the end of March this year. The Department does not record the number of individual tenancies transferred to new landlords.

§ Mr. Bayley
To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what new rights were introduced for council tenants between July 1992 and July 1993 to simplify and strengthen their ability to get minor repairs affecting health, safety or crime prevention carried out by their landlord.
148W

§ Sir George Young
The existing right to repair scheme was introduced under the Housing Act 1985 and came into effect on 1 January 1986. The new right to repair scheme is being introduced under the Leasehold Reform, Housing and Urban Development Act 1993 in place of the current scheme, from 1 April 1994. The new scheme will be more effective in ensuring that tenants get certain small urgent repairs affecting their health, safety or security done quickly and at no expense to them.

§ Mr. Bayley
To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what proportion of local authority tenants enjoyed delegated management as at July 1993.

§ Sir George Young
By July 1993, the Secretary of State for the Environment had approved 71 management agreements for tenant management organisations on local authority estates. These cover approximately 35,000 homes, representing about 0.9 per cent. of local authority dwellings.