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Tenants having to pay
As chairman of the Midlothian Tenants Forum I am writing to express our concern about the recent rent consultation letter which has been sent to all tenants in Midlothian.
As the only registered tenants group we were not consulted prior to the letter being sent out and we feel that we should have been included in this process.
Over the past six years, including this year, rents have increased by 36 per cent in order to fund the building of new houses and while we are in favour of the building of council housing we are opposed to this method of funding it. Tenants who are some of the poorest members of the community are yet again having their rents increased.
This at a time when interest rates are at an all time low. Why are we being faced with above inflationary increases?
We know that we need more social rented housing but anyone can apply for this type of housing so why then is it only the rent-paying tenants who are paying for this through the Housing Revenue Account?
The 'right to buy' has resulted in the reduction of the amount of social rented properties hence the growth in homelessness and the problems associated with it.
The new Housing Bill does not abolish the right to buy completely so there will be continually less housing stock. It would also be interesting to find out how many councillors live in council houses and how many of them have bought them.
Can (the council] provide the forum with details of the amount received from the sale of council houses and what this money has been used for?
We would like to have clear accounts to show us how the HRA is being allocated.
As the only RTO we feel that sometimes the council does not provide clear breakdowns of the HRA budget and we need a simple breakdown of what our rent is being spent on so we can compare this with other landlords.
Not everyone who lives in social rented housing is in receipt of benefits and such increases impact more on those who are in employment.
Much of the housing stock carries no debt as the loans borrowed for them have been paid off and those who have been tenants for years, many feel that they should only be paying for maintenance of stock and not building projects.
Peter Moonie
Chairman, Midlothian Tenants Forum
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Weather for Dalkeith
Saturday 11 February 2012
Today
Light rain
Temperature: 3 C to 6 C
Wind Speed: 10 mph
Wind direction: South west
Tomorrow
Cloudy
Temperature: 3 C to 7 C
Wind Speed: 8 mph
Wind direction: West
