Council building gets £800,000 kickstart

ALMOST £800,000 will be handed to Oldham as part of the biggest council house building programme for two decades.

The £797,500 aid will support the construction of 12 homes, Housing Minister John Healey announced.

The money will be split between building four homes in Clyde Street costing £265,000, five homes at a cost of £322,500 in Hawthorne Road and £210,000 for three homes at Rufford Close.

Oldham was one of 73 councils to be given a share of £122 million for 1,930 new homes. Councils are expected to match the funding provided by Government.

Mr Healey said: “We will back councils willing to build new council homes by giving them extra money so we can build the homes we need across the country. This will also help boost economic growth in the recession with jobs and apprenticeships so we have the skills for the future.

“Councils are showing they are ready and willing to build new council homes, and this marks a break from the past 30 years, when we now have councils ready and willing and able to build and Government ready and willing and able to back those councils to build.”

To secure the money, councils had to promise to create apprenticeships and job schemes.

“They also had to ensure work would start on site “with diggers and hard hats” by December.

Oldham East and Saddleworth MP Phil Woolas said: “This is a welcome and significant shift in policy. Demand for housing has not gone away in the recession and this is the start of a new programme which is vitally needed in Oldham.”

Mr Healey said the scheme was the biggest council house building programme for two decades and a “new type of council home” because the schemes would “largely sit alongside and add to the mix of existing neighbourhoods” rather than being built as separate estates. More than 40 per cent of all the new homes would be family homes — with three or four bedrooms — and more than 90 per cent would meet “the level above” the standard normally required for energy efficiency.

He added: “This is the first time councils have been able to get a Government grant to back council house building on a similar basis as housing associations.”