Jo Mitchell, assistant director of customer experience and support at Labour-run Wigan Council, said: “During the Covid-19 pandemic Wigan Council made a number of decisions that prioritised the wellbeing of our residents and businesses.
“During these times the write-off of uncollectable or historic rent arrears was not considered a priority as staff and resources were instead mobilised to provide maximum levels of support to all of the borough’s residents.”
Wigan Council claimed the £4.5m figure was the result of a return to business-as-usual after the pandemic, and multiple years of arrears being rolled into one.
Hackney Council – whose £2.5m in write-offs were the second-highest in the country – said: “There are circumstances when despite our best efforts we have to write-off debt, for example, if the former tenant is untraceable or has sadly died leaving little or no estate.
“If it becomes clear we can’t recover the debt, we have to make a difficult but practical decision.”
The figures correspond with a decline in real-terms spending on housing services of 4.3pc in England between 2013-14 and 2022-23.
Local authorities with more than 200 social dwellings are obliged to hold and publish a Housing Revenue Account (HRA) – a ring-fenced fund that legally cannot budget for a deficit.
The main sources of income to the HRA are rents and service charges. The main expenditure items are management, repairs and maintenance, all of which take a hit when the money to pay for them isn’t coming in. Over the course of the 2022-23 tax year alone, HRA reserves in England fell by 2.9pc.
Councillor Darren Rodwell, housing spokesperson for the Local Government Association (LGA), said: “Councils carefully consider their approach to rents to ensure that a careful balance is made between affordability for tenants and meeting costs for committed expenditure requirements and essential and urgent new works.”
