The news across the City of Edinburgh today is about the council scheme to "bribe" tenants out of their homes in order to free up some 500 spare rooms. An age old problem has always existed where large family homes remain in the possession of the tenant even after the children have grown and flown the nest and this approach will certainly take pressure off the housing department waiting lists.
The figure being quoted is £4000 with a hint at additional contributions towards moving expenses being made available. And with a waiting list of over 5000 people the possible injection of cash into the local economy will stimulate business in a multitude of ways.
A secondary benefit of the scheme will be the rejuvenation of communities, especially those built up around primary and secondary schools, where the ageing population has left the area barren of children. This follows the recent announcement of school closures within Edinburgh due to falling numbers within the classrooms. At the time this was attributed to the rising house prices in Edinburgh being prohibitive to family buyers in the town, but this new scheme highlights an older problem and offers a common sense incentive to solve it.
We can expect the words "green" and "environmental" to feature frequently in future comments, to seek public approval for the plans as the obvious benefit to the carbon footprint are hailed. Elderly couples and single tenants paying for heating and maintenance to redundant rooms can only be seen as wasteful so if the bribe doesn't do the trick we may see the spin doctors playing the green card in future press releases.
Of course the problem would also be eased if the high street banks were lending to buyers, but with no sign of funding being made available this move signals the local council belief that the situation is not about to improve.
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