COUNCIL housing chiefs will carry out a door-to-door blitz of council houses in Burnley and Padiham, to inform people about the proposed £74million housing stock transfer.

Management staff will visit 4,300 homes over the next three weeks and have already informally called at more than 700 to explain how the transfer to locally-based Housing Company - Burnley and Padiham Community Housing - will benefit tenants.

Burnley and Padiham Community Housing has guaranteed to spend £30million on improvements in the first five years of the transfer, as part of a total budget of £195million for the next 30 years.

The transfer will enable much-needed repairs and modernisation to be carried out to 5,600 council houses in the area, while at the same time keeping rents at an affordable level. The aim is to ensure that the tenants' existing rights are protected with six tenant representatives on the housing committee, along with six councillors and six independent local people.

Director of community services at Burnley Borough Council Ian Saville, said: "This is one of the most important decisions for tenants in Burnley and Padiham to make, because if the stock transfer goes ahead there is £195million being put into the housing stock.

"If we fail to get the message across to the tenants that investment would be lost."

The housing committee will meet on June 7 to review the outcome of the consultation period and analyse the comments from tenants.

It will then decide whether the ballot will go ahead, between June 21 to July 9.

Results would be out within a few days of the ballot.

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