Right to Buy Scheme: Greater London

(asked on 20th February 2015) - View Source

Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:

To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, how much from Right to Buy sales has been returned to the Treasury by each London borough in each of the last five years.


Answered by
Brandon Lewis Portrait
Brandon Lewis
This question was answered on 24th March 2015

Since the reform of the Housing Revenue Account and the introduction of Self-Financing in April 2012, a proportion of receipts are paid to Treasury in order to (a) reflect the reduction in the amount owed by local authorities to Treasury as part of the Self-Financing Settlement and (b) to tackle the budget deficit left by the last Administration.

The attached table shows those parts of the receipts arising from Right to Buy (or equivalent) sales received in each London borough in the previous five financial years and the first three quarters of the current financial year which have been indicated as payable to the Treasury. Since the reinvigoration of Right to Buy in April 2012, the 29 London stock-holding authorities have retained approximately £406 million for the purposes of providing replacement social housing in their local areas.

Overall, Right to Buy increases housing investment and housing construction. Since the Right to Buy was reinvigorated across England, £730 million in sales receipts are being re-invested in affordable house building; levering a further £1.7 billion of investment over the next 2 years. This means that in total, over £2.4 billion will be raised to invest in affordable house building as a result of Right to Buy.

In England, council house building starts are now at a 23 year high and almost twice as many council homes have been built in the last 4 years than from 1997 to 2009. Previously, councils were not encouraged to build new homes from sales receipts and only 1 new council home was built for every 170 Right to Buy sales completed under the last Administration.

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