Concerns of higher rents if States houses are handed over to the GHA

I AM NO mathematician but surely it does not take a genius to realise that if the States hands over all their properties to the Guernsey Housing Association, rents for the dwellings will be higher and it will be them (the States) paying for most of the increases with/through income support. Also I would challenge the deputies to live in one of the GHA houses for one whole year with their fortune frozen and on a pensioner’s money or the minimum wage and see how hard it really is to live in Guernsey at the other end of the ladder and what it is like to live in the rabbit hutches the GHA are building. Also once our illustrious leaders have got rid of States Works and the workers, how much more it is going to cost taxpayers to fund the increase it is going to take out of the pot to hire private firms to do the work? Have our politicians fallen into the trap of feeling success is going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm, as Winston Churchill once described it? It does really lead one to wonder. I have always felt that leaving it to the person or people who made/caused the problem in the first place to sort it out very rarely if ever really works. Only my opinion guys.

ROD HAMON

5, Rosemount

Mont Arrive

St Peter Port

Guernsey Housing Association LBG and the Committee for Employment & Social Security respond:

Thank you for the opportunity to respond to this letter.

All social housing rents, which include States Housing and Guernsey Housing Association properties, now have a common rent setting system, which establishes rents payable based on the benefits that properties offer such as the number of bedrooms, house or flat, and provision of parking, garden or balcony, and energy efficiency.

Not surprisingly a newly-built more energy-efficient home with lower fuel costs is charged a slightly higher rent than an older property. This change was effective from 1 January 2022.

Each year annual costs are reviewed in line with RPIX and proposed rent levels are discussed with and approved by the Committee for Employment & Social Security. Should the States of Guernsey decide to go ahead with a stock transfer to the GHA, an annual rent setting process will still be required, and the rent levels will still need the approval of the Committee for Employment & Social Security.

We aim to hold the level of average social housing rents at no more than approximately 80% of equivalent rents for properties of the same size in the private sector.