The government social housing rents consultation closed on 12th October 2022. The consultation covered options for capping social housing rent increases in 2023/24 below the agreed CPI+ 1% formula.
The CWAG submission to the consultation argues that the decision should be based on local discretion and local circumstances rather than an imposed cap. In practice most local authorities are unlikely to raise their rents in 2023 by the maximum permitted under the formula.
An imposed 5% cap will leave HRAs constrained and under-resourced in business planning terms for years to come. Given that any reduction below inflation will represent a saving to the Exchequer as housing benefit and Universal Credit are reduced, these savings should be used to provide additional grant funding for essential building safety, maintenance and carbon reduction programmes that will inevitably be stalled by rent capping.
