Wayne Nowaczyk, South Wales Echo

Feb 18th 2012

COUNCIL house tenants in Caerphilly have delivered an overwhelming “no” in a ballot about transferring their tenancies to a social landlord.

In the secret ballot, they voted almost two to one against transfer even though staying with the council will delay modernisation of their homes by about two years.

Of those voting, 65.2% were against switching to the not-for-profit, Community Housing Mutual, Castell Mynydd, while 34.8% voted in favour. Some 66.7% of the council’s 13,300 tenants voted in the ballot run by independent Electoral Reform Services.

Transfer could only go ahead if the majority of tenants who voted in the ballot, voted in favour of the proposal.

Caerphilly council has pledged to reveal its proposals in the next few months to take forward the investment to achieve the Welsh Housing Quality Standard.