Green Party launches local election campaigns!

The Green Party in England and Wales launched its local election campaign yesterday in Bristol.

Co-leader, Carla Denyer said "this country is facing an acute housing crisis. There are over 1 million households on council waiting lists.  In England the average home for sale now costs more than eight times the annual average household earnings.

We desperately need a massive increase in supply of affordable social housing. I hear regularly from people who have been living in unacceptable conditions crying out for a secure home or struggling to make ends meet because the rents are through the roof.

Council have a vital role to play, but they need a framework that supports them to provide the homes that people desperately need. We also need a fair deal for the millions of people renting in the private sector."

The policies, the Green Party would introduce include:

Providing funding to councils to meet their needs for affordable social housing and lift the restrictive rules on council borrowing for housebuilding, ensuring that at least an extra 150,000 council homes a year are made available through a mix of new build, refurbishment conversions and buying up existing homes.

Ending Right to Buy, enabling local authorities to keep council homes in the community for good

Taming the private rental market through rent controls

Creating a "community right to buy" giving councils housing associations and community housing groups first refusal to buy certain properties that come onto the market.

Co-leader Adrian Ramsay, who is standing as Parliamentary candidate for Waveney Valley added:

"Whilst our housing crisis is one of supply, it is also a crisis of housing quality and homes too often being built with a view to developers' profits rather than community needs."