Susie Sell,
Regeneration & Renewal,
23 November 2009
Westminster City Council and the London boroughs of Hackney and Croydon will be given greater freedom over how they spend funding from regeneration quango the Homes & Communities Agency on the delivery of affordable housing.
The three boroughs will pilot the Greater London Authority-led Delegated Delivery Scheme, which is intended to allow councils to decide on priorities for investment in their areas, Regeneration & Renewal has learned.
London mayor Boris Johnson's housing adviser, Richard Blakeway, said the boroughs were chosen because they present "a mix of housing challenges" that give a "snapshot of housing issues in London".
The pilots will run between April 2010 and March 2011, and Blakeway said the freedoms awarded to the councils would be determined on a case-by-case basis.
Blakeway also said that the GLA intends to begin a rolling programme for the scheme, with other boroughs taking up the initiative from next summer.
He said that, after April 2011, the Delegated Delivery Scheme proper would give boroughs indicative budgets for affordable housing delivery. However, Blakeway said this would not be possible for the pilot schemes as "there is still a lot of detail that needs to be worked out".
