Councils chosen as PSA housing pilots

Milton Keynes and Camden are amongst the twenty councils chosen to pioneer local public service agreements (PSAs) which tie extra resources to improved services.

Milton Keynes council hopes to agree a local PSA to reduce the estimated 1,000 people housed in temporary accommodation.

Chair of housing Kevin Wilson said : "We want to try to engineer some new ways of dealing with the problem by setting some difficult targets. We are still working on options but critically we have some key partners to work alongside."

Meanwhile, Camden council is hoping to extend its housing refurbishment strategic partnership pilot which it started as a PFI scheme.

Director of housing Neil Litherland said: "We have submitted an expression of interest. We had a successful partnering project and we would like to extend it on a wider scale."

Although the two councils were identified as two of seven pilots named by the Department of the Environment , Transport and the Regions and the Local Government Association, last month, their housing involvement has just been revealed (Housing Today, 3 August).

More than £1m is available to the councils for administrative and pump-priming costs plus rewards up to 2.5 per cent of their net budget requirement for 2000/01 if they meet their targets.

The DETR has also signed a PSA with the Treasury to ensure all housing is a of a decent standard by 2010. It has to achieve a 33 per cent reduction in the number of people in non-decent social housing by 2010.

It has to be cut by a third the number of people in non-decent social housing by 2004.

The other pilots named this week are Birmingham, Blackburn with Darwen, Cambridgeshire, Coventry, Derbyshire, Lewisham, Middlesborough, Newcastle, Newham, Richmond, Sheffield, Surrey, and Tameside.