"Where have the proceeds from the sale of council houses have gone?"

I’m wondering, like Patricia Barker, where the proceeds from the sale of council houses have gone, (Star, January 29)?

Largely to the Treasury, as local authorities are allowed to keep only a third of the proceeds.

Right from the start of the scheme, funds from the sale of these locally-owned assets have been siphoned off by successive Governments, which frequently also restricted how councils could use what was left, so it could not be used to build new social homes.

It was always rotten value, the sale of better properties pushing up the rents on the unsold properties with poorer tenants who could not afford to buy.

Right to Buy began at a time when the housing shortage of today was not dreamed of, and by cutting off the supply of new affordable homes has probably worsened that shortage, raising prices so that many young people despair of buying.

The less well-off are more likely to be faced with unaffordable rents in the private sector, risking more reliance on housing benefit or worse still, homelessness. Meanwhile, I’m sure the Treasury has spent the money it raised by selling our council houses somewhere, but it has not been here.