Let's turn the £1m plus cost of student council tax exemptions in Broxtowe to the advantage of everyone by putting £2m annually into housing for young people in Broxtowe

Reading my headline you may think that I have gone mad but hear me out. 

The first thing to say is what I'm proposing will mean landlords paying council tax at 100% on presently council tax exempt student properties. This would bring in c.£1m — a sum already paid by existing council tax payers to cover the shortfall. That money would continue to be collected as a young persons' housing precept, which added to the £1m from landlords, would create an annual income of c.£2m towards housing located in Broxtowe Borough for young people (who would have family/work links and students).

Rent charges suggest that landlords, for the most part, do not share their council tax exemption with their tenants. It is money most of them pocket (this claim is based on looking at weekly rent charges on Zoopla  and Rightmove websites today - £81pw for a room in a student let; £156pw for a 3 bed family semi is just one example - a student let would probably be at least 4 beds and, potentially, double the income from the house remaining a family let). ALL landlords should have to give every tenant an annual statement of what they do with the rent they charge: where the rent goes; the amount of any mortgage and the repayment terms; maintenance costs, repairs etc.

This annual £2m pot would help cover the loan costs of capital borrowed to build suitable housing for young people located throughout the Borough of Broxtowe. The housing would be managed by a housing co-op much like that already envisaged by students.

It is a win-win situation for everyone. Family housing can be protected by planning from landlords, who buy to let and, in the process, drive up prices. Older residents benefit because streets keep families and neighbourhoods are more balanced than they might otherwise be. Young people and students get purpose built housing which they manage as a co-op and it can take account of housing needs across Broxtowe Borough, not just in Beeston.

To those who say I’m living in Cloud Cuckoo Land, I would point out that change has to start somewhere so why not Broxtowe? and if there can be council precepts for business (ie. Beeston), town councils and parishes why not housing? Money ring fenced, as this money would be, would, I believe, attract support from across the whole community.

Initially, there would be lost council tax, but the council tax being paid by other previous exempt groups would cover this and within two years maximum the council would begin to receive additional council tax income from the new houses being occupied by young Broxtowe residents and students. The idea not only builds homes for young people but generates council tax income.

I can hear other voices saying you'll have to change the law to remove some of the council tax exemptions. With an existing high-profile MP and Greg Marshall in the wings waiting to take over, both have the skills and nous to persuade central government to make an exception of Broxtowe on a pilot basis — this kind of thing happens all the time. It could even be done by Parliamentary Bill.

Having spent 21 years of my life as a supported housing manager, preparing budgets and development briefs, I know what I’m proposing is viable, manageable, and something which can help resolve in some small part the housing need which exists in Beeston and across Broxtowe.

If you think my idea is rubbish then I challenge to come with a better, more affordable, viable solution and share it.

Coming soon a new (or is replacement?) café and bus map imitation.

The signage is up and through the windows there is a glimpse of what is coming. Until 2 December 2016 this location on Beeston High Road was occupied by Gourmet Delights. I did a posting to mark its demise.

At the time of Gourmet's closure the staff thought it was going to become another estate agent. In the event it has stood empty for nearly 15 months before becoming a café again, this time called Coffee & Cream. No opening date as yet, but  in the meantime one has to admire those responsible for their confidence. Others struggle, but you cannot visit them all and we do have our favourites.

On Friday I will be going to one of my favourites to enjoy a rare Stilton Roll with some coleslaw made on the premises. A picture I promise. Last  Thursday it was the best egg bacon & sausage roll you can buy in Beeston for a snip (£5) at Rosie Lea's on Wilkinson Street, off Wollaton Road and within yards of the entrance to Broxtowe Borough Council offices (the July 2017 blog post I have linked you includes a map).

Talking of maps, I have only recently noticed that Nottingham City Transport's September 2017 edition of their bus map (as impressive as always despite the fact that it stopped showing the tram and 'L' LocalLink bus routes a couple of years ago) includes student halls of residence across the city. It seems too much of a coincidence not to be linked to my inclusion of student accommodation on my Beeston map. I may be wrong of course, but it I praise NCT for doing it all the same:

Finally a reference back to my last post about my ideopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) and thank you to those who have contacted me. The post has actually breathed new life into BeestonWeek. Life goes on and people like me are very much part of Beeston. I have never been happy in 'exclusive' groups of any kind, despite joining them, so I am not about to dash off and spend my time exclusively in the company of fellow sufferers — which is why continuing a regular post here takes on a new importance.

Council Tax Exempt properties in Beeston and Broxtowe — a street-by-street list as at November 2017

The list of council tax exemptions on a street-by-street basis has been obtained by me making a Freedom of Information request to Broxtowe Borough Council at the end of 2016. The process was interrupted by me having open heart surgery at the end of February 2017 followed by four months recovery, then in November my being ill for three weeks and my wife Susan being diagnosed with breast cancer. All these  things have contributed to the delay, but I think it's been worth waiting for. Below are the totals for Broxtowe Borough Council area as at November 2017 summarised by location (my work):

BROXTOWE BOROUGH COUNCIL

TAX EXEMPTIONS AT NOVEMBER 2017

There is one important caveat. My 2015 summary of Council Tax exempt student properties in the Borough of Broxtowe (which can be found in the column to the right) was provided by the Council in February 2015 and the person who compiled the data for me has since left and the program used has changed. The changes between February 2015 and November 2017 are not what I was expecting:

I had confidently expected the total for 2017 to be higher than 2015. It is lower! The compiler in 2015, who no longer works for the Council, almost certainly used a different methodology to the compiler in 2017. The officer I have worked with suspects that the 2015 totals included adults who qualified for a 'student (council tax) discount' of 25% where two people live in the same property. This would help explain the higher 2015 totals.

Looking ahead to 2018 and future years, logic says I go with the person compiling the 2017 data. We have met twice and exchanged numerous e-mails and logic says that November 2017 has to be taken as Year 1 and that from now on data is collected and made public for November using the same methodology as 2017.

The list below is of Beeston Council Tax exempt student properties. I have created separate location lists for all the locations in the the above summary. The data from the Council is one long list with the first column showing the location of the street. I have compiled the above table of Broxtowe locations and verified it against the overall total on the Broxtowe Borough Council spreadsheet.

I leave it to you, the reader, to make what you will of the data. If you would like a PDF version of the full street-by-street list for Broxtowe please contact me.

There some quirks/anomalies in the Beeston list below, as I suspect there are in other location lists (eg. A Gladstone Street/Gladstone Street; Beacon Flats/Beacon Flatts; the use of Rd/Road results in separate entries and Ewe Lamb Lane has 9 location entries as Beeston, 8 as Stapleford and 100 as Bramcote. It is part of the Bramcote/Stapleford boundary, but it highlights how what you get out depends on what you put in!). 

Also, to place the data below I had to cut and paste and I have done it in haste — hence the difference widths. The entries are as they appear in the Council spreadsheet. I have added the column headings:

PROPS is for no. of properties in each street which could pay council tax.

EXEMPTIONS is the no. of council tax exempt properties in the named street.

STUDENT is the no. of properties exempt in the named street because all the occupants are in full-time education.

HIMO is the no. of properties in the named street registered as a House in Multiple Occupation. HIMOs can be occupied by groups other than students and may be paying council tax because the occupants are not exempt from paying council tax.

I have asked for a category breakdown of Broxtowe Borough Council 1,137 exemptions total. The Council has a discount and exemption webpage. Click here to see it. 

BEESTON COUNCIL TAX EXEMPTIONS AT NOVEMBER 2017  

From a 'beach' in Beeston to Dunkirk in four hours ten minutes

This post has minimal text, just captions as brief as I can make them. Anyone who knows me well will know that brevity does not come easy to me. This post is all about the pictures. At the end you will find a map of the route my walk followed.

'Beeston-on-Sands' has taken over the abandoned town bus station for the duration of the school holidays.  

Excluding Smith's, which sells new books, there is only Oxfam which sells second-hand books...

... 'Book Land' which sells remaindered books, now, as the sign says, either for £1 or £2. Most of the charity shops have small book sections, even the supermarkets now provide racking where customers can leave or pick up a book.

I bought Nottingham Transformed for £2. When published in 2006 the book cost £24.95. Its full of great photographs of Nottingham past and present as well as drawings of proposed future developments at the time of publication. Most of these aspirational visions of the city lost out to the financial crash.

The Sewing Box which is housed on Willoughby Street behind Barnsdales the Butchers, is now selling fabric. Mike Barnes, the owner, was just setting up his outside stall when he got his first customer...

...quickly followed by another. You can find The Sewing Box on my Beeston Vertical map.

Gourmet Delights closed on 2nd December last year. I did a blog at the time. It still stands empty.

You have a measure of how hard it is to let retail units on Beeston High Road when an estate agent as good as C P Walker & Son is forced to do this!

Odin's Table came and went in what seems a matter of months. Now it's another empty Beeston shop.

One person who is making a go of it is Lucy at 2 Little Magpies. Whilst have a wander around her lovely little craft and gift shop I came across these toddle 'London Bus' waistcoats. I have asked her to get me a price for a grown-up version.

I wonder how many folk have noticed the new housing going up behind Home Made Bakery?

It is a development by the long established local builder Hofton & Son on their old Roberts Yard site, comprising of a terrace of ten house. Visit their website to learn more. At £195,000 they are not cheap. Whilst I was taking this photograph Susan and I were invited to have a look around one of the houses. We wanted them to impress but they didn't.

What we did see from the Roberts Yard was the back of a development at the Broadgate end of Marlborough Road, where an old retail unit looks like it's being transformed into housing. The bamboo and fatsia look like they have been there forever.

Susan and I stopped at The Coffee House for a light lunch. It was until recently Mason & Mason, but has been 're-branded' by the owners. It is a cafe we have been visiting since it first opened in 2011. They do lovely salads and have a brunch menu that goes on into the afternoon. It was about 1pm when we sat down to Eggs Benedict and Egg Royale. They really do do a perfect poached egg.

After lunch Susan left me and I began my wander along Broadgate towards Dunkirk. This road sign at the junction of Broadgate and Broadgate Avenue remains in view thanks to the houseowner who trims his hedge to ensure passers by can still see the sign.

And its ditto for Peveril Road.

Along this stretch of Broadgate is a boundary marker dated 1933. To the left it is Beeston (now Broxtowe) and to the right the City of Nottingham (Lenton).

A part of me is loath to share the picture for fear of someone stealing it, but it's worth looking for

The Salthouse Lane road sign has no diligent householder to attend it, so in the absence of City Council care it has been lost from view (well almost)!

I like all my walks to have a bus nearby just in case I get tired or it begins to rain. In this case a Trent-Barton Indigo bus. Its driver has just let off a lady carrying two shopping bags and about to turn into Salthouse Lane. Perhaps she has been to Chilwell Retail Park (M&S Food) or Long Eaton Market rather than Beeston town centre? Someone said once that 'A bus is a community on wheels where people get to know one another and lives get exchanged'

Just beyond the bus is this row of lovely houses with pollarded trees.

At the University end of Broadgate another hidden road sign.

This entrance to part of Nottingham University has to be the best. To see it walk straight across from Broadgate and past the University's controlled west entrance and it's just don on the right.

A very different view of the University from Jubilee Avenue. Behind you is Florence Boot Hall. A few yards to the right and you are walking into Highfields Park.

The waterfall in Highfields Park is not always turned on, but it was last Tuesday. Back in the 1980s and into the 1990s all this was clean enough for me, my children and grandchildren to paddle in. Lack of care and maintenance as the City Council had to deal with budget cuts imposed by central government have seen it silt up...

...Now it's dogs who have all the fun. Off camera a little girl is crying because she can't join the dog!

I have included this picture as large as I can so that in the distance you can see a tram gliding by on a section of reserved track. Between the tram and the park is University Boulevard.

This is part of the footpath which hugs the north side of Highfields lake.

I wait to cross East Drive on the University Campus and into the Lakeside Arts Centre as a City Transport 34 bus goes by. The students have gone and it's coming up to 3.30pm but the bus has quite a few passengers. NCT have worked hard over many years to establish this route, so it is disappointing to see in County Council's August 2017 list of bus service changes that from September the 34 will run during term times only. 

Inside the Arts Centre a dinosaur grabs my attention. It's a free spinoff off the dinosaur exhibitiion currently on in Wollaton Hall.

To read the signage telling you more about the dinosaur, click on the image to enlarge.

In the Art Centre's cafe I sit for awhile sipping my Dandelion & Burdock (no ice) and catch a tram passing by. There can't be many better places to sit if you want to watch trams go by.

Outside I catch this pic of a tram as it glides past the Arts Centre on its way to Nottingham City Centre, Bulwell and Hucknall.

Then I crossed University Boulevard (or is it Beeston Road at this point?) and caught sight of the footpath beside Tottlebrook, which takes me to Dunkirk and my destination, a car repair bodyshop beside Beeston Cut, where I am having a dent and some scratches (of my own making) removed from our car.

Along sections I have to brush the blackberries away which dangle in front of me. I eat a good few as I go.

The footpath and Tottlebrook bend just before I reach Dunkirk. Not a sound apart from the brook and the birds which seem to occupy every tree and bush. 

Then I burst out onto Montpelier Road at its junction with Claude Street. Not quite a war zone, but look to the right (see pic below) as well and you can be forgiven for thinking that parts of Dunkirk are in need of attention and restoration.

As far as I'm concerned landlords, the University and the City Council are responsible, but a good few of what remaining locals there are blame 'students'.

Dunkirk housing stock is c.80% student housing and it forms part of historic Lenton — hence the City Council ward name, Dunkirk and Lenton (which I can say Susan and I are truly responsible for).

The arguments which rage around Brexit mirror the arguments which have raged around university expansion and accommodation since the 1980s. The incomers are blamed — not those who encouraged them to come in the first place, then failed to provide accommodation and the extra services and facilities needed to manage more people.

There are some lovely Victorian semis and terraces in Dunkirk, a good few of which are adorned with ceramic tiles like these. All different, put together by workman as it took their fancy on the day. I'm sure there is a dissertation on them waiting to researched and published.

My very last picture, and bleak as it appears, is my favourite. The end of Montplelier Road. To the left of this pic is a low railway bridge, as grubby as this broken window and broken panes of glass. Dunkirk gets more depressing every visit I make. Those who hang on, working to keep what community that's left alive are local heroes. Once I was one of them. Not any more. I imagine an independent Dunkirk, in charge of its own destiny (as I do every neighbourhood).