Campaigning charity the Empty Homes Agency is gearing up to launch its new campaign to bring down the number of empty homes. The main public launch of the campaign will be during Empty Homes Week, which runs from 1st to 5th December 2014, but emails have already been sent to council Leaders today with a view to getting local authorities to pledge support to the new initiative formally.
Helen Williams, Chief Executive of the EHA, has copied to EHN the email sent to council Leaders, which reads as follows:
We are asking local authorities to sign up to support the Empty Homes Agency campaign to reduce long-term empty homes across England.
The pledge
In doing so, we are asking you to pledge, as a local authority supporter, to:
- Have an empty homes plan or strategy for your area, with aspirations to reduce the number of long-term empty homes[1].
- Seek to attract and/or allocate resources in your area to refurbish empty homes or empty spaces above shops for those in housing need. Working in partnership with property owners, housing associations and community organisations to do so.
To show your support, simply email:
policy@emptyhomes.com, with the message: “we are a local authority supporter of the Empty Homes Agency campaign to reduce the number of long-term empty homes across England”, and the subject line: “Local authority supporter of the campaign to reduce the number of long-term empty homes”. It would be great if you could email us soon, and by the end of December 2014 at the latest.
As part of our campaign, we will be asking all the Westminster political parties to pledge that, should they form the next government, they will adopt a plan to tackle empty homes within their first year in power, as part of a wider approach to tackling housing need. We believe priority should be given to this work, as bringing empty homes back into use plays an important role in meeting housing needs.
Empty Homes week
We are also encouraging local authorities to publicise their empty homes work, particularly during Empty Homes Week starting the 1st December. Please let us know what you have planned and tell us about the coverage you get by emailing
policy@emptyhomes.com. Our aim is to ensure that we secure lots of coverage of the good work being done, up and down the country, to bring empty homes back into use.
Long-term empty homes are those homes that have been empty for six or more months.
