Green councillors will press for warm, affordable homes
26 April 2008
Peter Tatchell, Green Party Parliamentary Candidate for Oxford East, joined Oxford Green councillors Matt Sellwood and Elise Benjamin to launch the Green Party's national 'warm, affordable homes' campaign this Friday.
Peter Tatchell launched of the national 'warm, affordable homes' campaign tomorrow, talking about Green Party policies and campaigns to provide affordable housing in city and town centres throughout the country.
Green councillors are leading the way, from Morpeth Greens securing £200,000 for affordable housing to Kirklees Green securing £143 million dedicated to bringing council housing up to a decent standard. Greens councillors in Sheffield, Brighton, Norwich and Kirklees are leading the way in pushing councils to increase levels of council owned affordable homes in every new-build residential project.
Green councillors across the country are committed to putting social and environmental justice at the top of the political agenda. Creatingand maintaining warm, affordable housing and renewable energy and energy efficiency initiatives, Greens are already implementing ideas and policies in local authority council chambers up and down the UK, and will remain core to our campaigns when we are elected to Westminster.
Peter Tatchell, who is the human rights spokesperson for the Green Party, said:
"Warm, affordable and a secure accommodation is a basic human need - and right. Hundreds of thousands of people are living in substandard conditions - overcrowded , condensation, rising damp and poor insulation.
"The Green Party is urging a major expansion of well designed, high quality, low cost, energy efficient social housing, in order to improve the quality of people's lives, end fuel poverty and combat global warming.
"Green housing makes sense."
Through holding the 'balance of power' on the City Council over the last four years, Oxford Greens have secured a number of initiatives on affordable housing, including the provision of renewable energy within council housing, discounted insulation for vulnerable citizens, and the transformation of disused garage sites into social housing. In addition, during their time running the council in 2000-2002, Green councillors pioneered legislation to compel developers to provide 50% affordable housing on the site of any major new developments within Oxford.
Cllr Matt Sellwood, Deputy leader of the Green Group on Oxford Council, added:
"Over the last four years, Green councillors have held the balance of power on the City Council. During that time we have pushed forward innovative plans for sustainable housing, renewable energy, and fuel poverty alleviation - and secured the funding to make them a reality.
"Across the country, Green councillors are doing the same - and where Greens are elected, people want more. We are clearly the progressive choice for the future."
