Herefordshire ahead of the game on mortgage rescue scheme

Herefordshire Council is ahead of the game in already running a Mortgage Rescue Scheme using its own capital and has committed £1million to helping homeowners avoid repossession.

Staff from the council's strategic housing unit have already been asked to attend seminars and good practice workshops, supported by Communities and Local Government (CLG) and the Northern Housing Consortium on the scheme and have also been inundated by requests from other authorities for further information about how the scheme works.

Councillor John Jarvis, Herefordshire Council's cabinet member for the environment and strategic housing, said: "The Mortgage Rescue Scheme used to exist in the 1990s but the government stopped funding it some time ago.

"In Herefordshire, however, we decided the scheme was so important in preventing homelessness that we would fund it from our own resources," he added.

Councillor Jarvis, together with Councillor Roger Phillips, leader of Herefordshire Council, met Prime Minister Gordon Brown on Monday and were praised for the council's running of the scheme.

Councillor Jarvis added: "We have yet to see the detail from the government's announcement of funding for the announced scheme but will be working hard to ensure Herefordshire gets as much of the available money as possible."

The Government has also announced an immediate £400 million boost in spending power for affordable housing schemes and, for the first time, local authorities with existing stock will able to apply for this grant to build social housing, alongside registered social landlords.
Councillor Jarvis added: "This money is not new but has been brought forward in a bid to stimulate and support affordable housing completions and get the market moving.

"The challenge for us, however, is a shortage of land opportunities for 100 per cent affordable housing schemes and the fact that, because of the credit crunch, private developers have halted the development of larger sites which were going to deliver 35 per cent of affordable housing alongside the private housing.

"We will be talking to developers to see if the delivery of all, or some of the housing, can be helped by any of the Government measures announced," he added.