Right to sell?

The Government’s Right-to-Buy housing policy could be disastrous for rural communities, warns one of the county’s leading rural housing experts.

Professor Mark Shucksmith, an author and Newcastle University academic, feels the plans, which aim to extend the right-to-buy to 1.3 million housing association tenants, “makes no sense”, causing exceptional damage in rural communities.

“There is already a shortage of affordable housing, especially in rural areas where there is little social housing,” says Shucksmith.

“Disposing of housing association stock, at great cost to the taxpayer, will make the impact on rural communities much more serious. We urgently need more affordable homes to be built, not the disposal of the few that remain in rural areas. Government should reconsider the Right-to-Buy extension.”

To oppose the right-to-buy policy sign the petition at www.generationrent.org