Cllr Britcliffe is doing things right! - Page 7

Neil · 06-10-2010, 17:34

Quote:

Originally Posted by gynn

There is "shoddy" and there is "no option to demolish". The Council has discretion over the former, but has a statutory responsibility over the latter.

Ok thats fair enough. How do they decide how much to pay for the properties?

jaysay · 06-10-2010, 17:42

Quote:

Originally Posted by Neil

I best go and spank myself for taking us off thread

Naughty Naughty Neil

gynn · 06-10-2010, 17:54

Quote:

Originally Posted by Neil

Ok thats fair enough. How do they decide how much to pay for the properties?

Unless things have changed since I was around in local government, it is the District Valuer that provides an independent valuation..

Valuation Office Agency - homepage

JCB · 06-10-2010, 18:19

Quote:

Originally Posted by MargaretR

I doubt whether many of the residents of Pendle St actually had buildings insurance.
'

My friend whom I mentioned did have insurance .
She kept her house in good condition .
A widow , she had lived in the house since her marriage in the 1960s .
It had many memories for her , and although some , not all , of the property around her was neglected she wanted to stay there .

In 1994 the renovation of the other 3 terraces in the street was completed . For some reason her terrace wasn't renovated . The row of houses back to her on Fountain St weren't renovated , but the terrace facing them on Fountain St was .

All so strange and confusing .

Neil · 06-10-2010, 18:25

I want mine renovating for free as well please. We are in a conservation area but I don't see HBC or LCC conserving anything

jaysay · 06-10-2010, 18:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by Neil

I want mine renovating for free as well please. We are in a conservation area but I don't see HBC or LCC conserving anything

You live on one of the nicest streets in Ossy

Neil · 06-10-2010, 21:47

I know but there is still no conservation done here

Alan Varrechia · 06-10-2010, 22:09

Nice streets and Ossy. Come on Jay which one do you mean????

jaysay · 07-10-2010, 09:16

Quote:

Originally Posted by Alan Varrechia

Nice streets and Ossy. Come on Jay which one do you mean????

Sorry Alan won't put anybodies abode on here, would get my hands and face smacked by the mods, and it could be worse in Neils case as he is a MOD

Any way they are all nice streets in Ossy, God's own country

g jones · 10-10-2010, 22:09

Quote:

Originally Posted by Neil

That was a bad move in my opinion.

I think Council houses should remain Under Council control but should be managed correctly.
Why can a private company manage upgrade the houses when the Council could not?
I also disagree with selling Council houses to tenants at reduced prices. Its like burning Council Tax payers money.

I agree. I did not vote for stock transfer as it gave away the peoples money/assets accrued over decades with little return. RTB should have been good thing but has been a disaster. Poorly thought out, badly executed.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ken Moss

As Neil has posted, the magic wand called 'buildings insurance' which would have sorted the whole problem out.

For some reason the council promised to take it on during an election campaign and all of a sudden we're left with a collossal liability that we can't do a thing with.

You're coming across well as a Tory sympathiser but if Labour had done the same thing I don't think we'd be having this discussion. I wouldn't be happy if our lot had been responsible either.

A good example of council acquisitions is South Shore/Blackpool Street in Oswaldtwistle which I have seen recently and am very impressed with. Again, the management could have been better but buying up empty houses and trying to bring them back into use for first-time buyers is a good idea and one that I'm pursuing. The timing just happened to be lousy in this instance but it wasn't really anyone's fault that the housing market chose that particular moment to collapse.

Blackpool and SS St. IIRC 19 of the 27 were owned by private landlords who had run the properties down. It is in St Andrews Ward. The council spent around £1.4million IIRC of Council Tax (equivalent to £42 per property in Hyndburn) doing them up with no return, ie the landlords got a free property repair worth around £40,000 per property. I could be slightly out with the figures as memories merge!

Subsequent surveys,though i made the point prior, surveys were not required it was obvious, that internal works serve no purpose and in some cases enforcement can be used for external works including appearance.

This should have been the option. It was an option I did point out at the time. We should not be doing up private landlords properties for them to simply make more money from.

Quote:

Originally Posted by gynn

The houses in Pendle Street didn't fall into disrepair overnight. It was a process that took several years, so buildings insurance (renewable annually) would have long since ceased to be available.

The Council always used to deal with with such problems through its Slum Clearance programme, and got the money back from central government. Nowadays it has to meet the costs itself. It doesn't have a choice if the houses are in a bad enough state (as the surveys apparently show).It is a statutory duty.

Don't blame the ruling group. Blame the system.

This misses the whole point. At each sale point an individual survey should have been carried out revealing the damage to the foundations. Those that noticed it should have had retrospective claim on he surveyors. Or if the defects were discovered later, on their buildings insurance.

Like Blackpool Street,if the Council has to step in then in short it wants all of it's investment back in the form of equity.

Most properties are landlord owned on this block. Most done by cash sale with no insurance or survey. The Council should pay the actual value.

The cost is now £2.3m to be paid by every Council Tax payer in Hyndburn. Or £70 per household. I think there are 21 houses?? Or thereabouts.

garinda · 25-11-2011, 10:10

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ken Moss

New member vimtocreed has put it to the forum that Peter Britcliffe must surely be doing something right:

http://www.accringtonweb.com/forum/849408-post35.html

It has been levelled at me, quite fairly, that I have not exactly been over-complimentary of the Hyndburn Conservative policies, with particular reference to Peter Britcliffe's way of doing things.

To balance things out it would be nice to hear about some of the things that the public at large think he has done well.

Over to you....

I heard he's kind to small animals.

Which is nice.