PLANS to transfer the district's council houses to a local housing company have been shelved. Extra Government cash for housing means that the council should be able to improve and maintain the district's council houses without having to transfer the entire housing stock to a private housing company. Housing Chief, Ian Barker said he was delighted that they were no longer being forced to transfer council houses to the private sector.

"Most councillors and tenants were reluctant to consider a transfer," he said. However, under previous spending plans we would not have been able to maintain, let alone improve our housing stock. Although there are still problems, we can now see our way to providing a first class service while retaining ownership."

He added: "Increased tenant involvement has been a very positive outcome of the investigations. We will continue to work with our tenants to improve the service we give. We are already discussing future refurbishment programmes with tenant representations."

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