A £28 MILLION Holyrood handout aimed at boosting the number of affordable homes in Dumbarton, the Vale and Clydebank is “nowhere near enough”, according to local Labour politicians.

Last week the Scottish Government announced the grant to West Dunbartonshire Council in an attempt to stimulate investment in the housing sector.

But local Labour politicians claim the funding falls well short of the level required – and that the funding formula, to work out the allocations, is too heavily stacked in favour of housing association tenants.

It’s hoped areas such as Castlehill, Westcliff, Haldane and Bonhill can be rejuvenated by the scheme – which takes place over the next three years.

The move is designed to help local authorities and house-builders plan their investment and provide certainty on the amount of funding available until 2021.

In 2018-19, £8.634 million will be allocated in grant funding to West Dunbartonshire Council – rising to £9.768 million in 2019-20 and £10.421 million in 2020-21.

But Labour group leader at WDC, Councillor Martin Rooney, said: “The council had already assumed this funding in its housing investment plans which were agreed in February.

“Labour’s former housing convener, Cllr David McBride had argued for an even greater increase in funding for the council on the basis that council tenants should receive the same level of funding support as tenants in housing associations.

“Unfortunately, the (Housing) minister has not accepted his arguments and has stuck with the unfair Scottish Government funding formula.”

Cllr McBride added: “We had committed to building at least 1,000 new social homes over the next five years and we are making great progress with this. I want to see West Dunbartonshire residents get a fairer deal so that we can build even more homes.

“If the minister had accepted my proposal then this would have meant an extra 100 new homes could have been built on top of what we had already planned.

“We have shown that we can deliver on our ambitions but the Scottish Government continue to treat council house tenants as second class citizens when it comes to this funding.”

Housing Minister Kevin Stewart said the money would support the government’s ambitious commitment of delivering 50,000 affordable homes by 2021.

He said: “We are ensuring that West Dunbartonshire has homes that are high-quality, efficient and affordable.

“We are announcing to local authorities how much money they’ll have to invest in affordable housing until the end of this Parliament.

“It means they can plan these new affordable homes now – with the certainty that the funding will increase year-on-year.

“This is also an important signal to the house-building sector in Scotland and demonstrates our commitment to the industry and the estimated 14,000 jobs our affordable housing supply programme supports each year.”

Jackie Baillie, Dumbarton and the Vale’s MSP, said: “The previous housing convener, Labour’s David McBride, developed West Dunbartonshire’s ambitious plans to build 1,000 new homes for social rent over the next five years.

“This will include new council and housing association homes in Castlehill, Westcliff, Haldane, Bonhill and many other local communities. So this investment is welcome as it builds on that good work.

“That said, I believe that the SNP Government should go further and commit to building 60,000 affordable homes across Scotland, at least 45,000 of which should be for social rent. That is the figure that industry experts tell us we should be aiming for to make a real start on tackling Scotland’s housing crisis.”

Council leader Jonathan McColl has welcomed the investment.

He told the Reporter: “This investment is very welcome and by giving us a number of years funding, we can properly plan our building programme and hopefully make some savings through intelligent phasing of developments.

“Put simply, housing associations have higher costs, a fact known by Councillors McBride and Rooney, and I’m disappointed that Labour don’t value our joint working with housing associations.

“I consider housing associations as partners of the council in providing social housing for local people, and I will not allow this unhelpful negativity from the Labour party to diminish our joint working or slow us down.”