PENDLE is bidding to spend £4 million to boost its crumbling housing stock and help the area's homeless.

The council has drawn up a housing strategy blueprint to show Ministers the borough's urgent need for investment.

The programme highlights problem areas which need Government cash, including:

Almost 5,500 private homes in the area are unfit to live in.

A total of 25,000 private homes need urgent repairs, up from 14,950 last year.

An increase in the number of homeless people from 458 to 510.

A rehousing list of more than 1,325 people.

In effect, the council is bidding for permission from the Government to spend the money, which will come from borrowing, Government grants and council receipts.

Pendle is competing against other local authorities across the country for a slice of tightly-controlled public sector borrowing. Deputy council leader Tony Greaves, said: "The strategy proves that there is a pressing need for better investment in the borough's housing stock.

"One of our problems is that Pendle has thousands of Victorian terraced houses built last century and we need money to help home-owners to make improvements. Basically, we've got a problem and we're not being allowed to sort it out."

Councillor Jo Belbin, chairman of the council's Pendle Services committee which discussed the bid last night, said: "Our aim is to stop the year by year drop in housing investment spending which has been forced on Pendle by the Government."

She added: "If the Government stops the council investing in its own housing we will not be able to keep it up to scratch."

Two out of every three homes in the area are terraced houses and 2,000 (6.1 per cent of the total private houses in the borough) are empty, twice the national average.

Councillors praised the Nelson-based Marsden Building Society for its commitment to housing and its firm stand on remaining a building society rather than converting to a bank like some of its larger national rivals.

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