Council Renews Role as Public Housing Landlord
Hastings Borough Council’s coalition cabinet of Labour and Green party councillors agreed unanimously last week to renew its role as a direct provider of affordable social housing.
Since 1996, when the council transferred the whole of its housing stock to 1066 Housing Association (now trading as Optivo), it has not owned any lettable residential property, and has had to rely either on housing associations or on private sector landlords to fulfil its obligations to the homeless.
Now, backed by a grant from Homes England, it intends to provide six one-bedroom flats in York Buildings (above Millets store in Wellington Place) on affordable rents to tenants selected from its housing register.
CREDIT: Dave Young
Cllr Maya Evans, deputy leader and portfolio holder for Housing and Community Development, described the decision as a “small step closer to our target of delivering 500 affordable rented homes across the borough.”
Harrow Lane to be ‘zero-carbon’
A much larger contribution to Cllr Evans’ target is in the offing from the controversial housing development on the former playing fields of Harrow Lane. Here social housing provider Orbit has teamed up with modular construction firm IIke Homes with the intention of building 140 affordable properties – 70 for rent, the other 70 for shared ownership.
The construction will involve manufacture of units in an off-site factory, which looks like a loss to the local building economy. However, it is claimed that such modular methods will bring much quicker completion – the first houses are aimed to be installed by next summer and the whole estate completed in 2024. Additional claims are made for both quality of finish and for energy efficiency.
Eighty-four of the homes are intended to be ‘zero carbon’. Each will be fitted with an air source heat pump (ASHP) and solar panels which, when combined, will provide clean energy. The entire scheme – which will deliver a mix of apartments and houses ranging in size from one to four bedrooms – will be gas-free, running on renewable power generated from the ASHPs and solar panels.
Cllr Evans is clearly impressed, commenting: “We are absolutely delighted with the progress of this project: we are providing affordable homes for local people, alongside addressing the climate emergency. Ilke Homes have gone above and beyond in ensuring 84 homes are zero carbon, this means the energy they use will be 100% renewable, on top of fabric-first sustainable building materials. Hastings Borough Council are now seeing the fruits of our vision, to provide high quality homes for people on low incomes, while playing an active role in reducing carbon emissions for our town. This is a very proud moment and just the start of more to come.”
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