Issue - meetings

To consider the following motions:

Motion in the name of Councillor Jack Homer:

That this Council recognises that due to high house prices and the lack of sufficient social housing, the proportion of people renting privately in the UK has doubled since 2004; half of 18-35s, 1 in 4 families with children, and growing numbers of older people now live in privately rented homes.

Most of England’s 11 million renters are on tenancies with fixed terms of six months or a year; after this period has ended, landlords can evict their tenants with just two months’ notice, without giving them a reason. These ‘no fault evictions’ were introduced under section 21 of the 1988 Housing Act; before this, renters had much greater security and it was difficult for landlords to evict tenants who paid the rent on time and looked after the property.

Evictions are the number one cause of homelessness. 80% of evictions are on no-fault grounds, and 63% of private renters who were forced to move in 2016 were evicted not due to any fault of their own but because the landlord wanted to sell or use the property.

Insecurity harms quality of life for tenants, with private renters less likely than either owners or people in council housing to say they know lots of people in their local area, but more worried that they will have to move within the next year. The threat of being evicted also gives landlords huge power over tenants, who may decide not to complain about disrepair, big rent increases or other problems in case they are kicked out.

In Germany, the Netherlands and Sweden (among other countries), tenancies are indefinite, meaning blameless tenants cannot be evicted from their homes.

In 2017, the Scottish government made tenancies indefinite and banned no-fault evictions under the terms of the Private Housing (Tenancies) (Scotland) Act 2016.

This Council believes:

Abolishing section 21 would help to make renting more secure, improve standards, increase tenant confidence and ultimately contribute towards making renting a viable long-term alternative to home ownership or social rent for the millions who currently cannot access either.

This Council resolves to request that the Chief Executive write to our Members of Parliament requesting them to publicly state their support for the abolition of section 21 and make it a manifesto commitment.

Motion in the name of Councillor Bill Fairfoull:

This Council wants to be able to offer young people leaving care the widest choice of accommodation and is concerned that current benefit rules and regulations are limiting options for care leavers as a result because of the unintended consequences of regulations for housing allowances and resolves to write to the Minister for the Department for Work and Pensions asking for the following changes to be made:

1.      Removal of the “spare room subsidy” for all care leavers up to 25 in the socially rented sector as this regulation has the unintended consequences of limiting care leavers to renting one bedroomed properties from social landlords.  ...  view the full agenda text for item 9.

To consider the following motions:

Motion in the name of Councillor Mills:

That this Council believes that bus services are crucial to our residents when travelling around our borough and Greater Manchester as a whole. This Council also believes that buses are vital for residents accessing important health services such as GP surgeries; getting to and from places of employment and living day to day lives. Furthermore, this Council believes that the regulation of buses is essential in the creation of a sustainable and environmentally healthy city region. 

Under deregulation the existing bus system across Greater Manchester has not been fit for purpose. It is important that as a result of this we note the following:

·         80% of public transport journeys in Greater Manchester are done by bus.

·         Bus deregulation happened across most cities and town in the UK in the 1980s, meaning that bus companies can run whatever routes they like, charging whatever they choose, with various ticketing structures. 140 types of tickets are available in Greater Manchester.

·         A regulated network is how buses are in London and Jersey. In these places a local transport authority sets prices, routes and develops standard ticketing systems. In London, Transport for London puts all bus routes out to tender and buys the service from a company.

·         Regulation mean profits can be used to subsidise socially necessary services. It also allows a simple smart ticket system, with an automatic daily cap of spend, like the oyster card in London. Without regulation, a simple and single area-wide zonal ticket, with an automatic cap on spend (examples include London’s oyster card), is impossible.

·         76% of people in Greater Manchester want buses to be regulated, according to recent polling.

·         Bus journeys have declined by 40% in Greater Manchester since deregulation, while in London bus use has doubled. In Jersey, bus ridership has gone up by 32% in the last five years alone.

This Council believes that local government should have the ability to plan, join up and design the bus network in Greater Manchester, and compel bus companies to deliver certain standards. Our current bus network is far too vulnerable to instabilities as we have seen, with routes changed and fares raised, hitting some of our most vulnerable residents.

The announcement of the Our Pass and Our Network schemes by the Mayor of Greater Manchester are welcomed, along with the recent public announcement by the Greater Manchester Combined Authority that bus franchising is the preferred option for buses across the city region. However this council believes that these are only the first steps in ensuring that the best bus services possible are delivered to not only the residents of our borough but of the city region as a whole.

Therefore, this Council resolves to support the Better Buses for Greater Manchester campaign, which is calling for better, regulated buses.

Motion in the name of Councillor Cooney

The Council notes that:

Unite has members across many different sectors of the economy and following the merger with  ...  view the full agenda text for item 11.