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Could you live without the internet? Nowadays we go online to do everything from banking to the weekly shop. Life with internet access is simply more convenient. And more sociable too. Find out how we gave the internet a new home in Rochdale.

Rochdale Boroughwide Housing was disconnected
The government sees internet access as a fundamental part of our society. And it’s top of the Rochdale Boroughwide Housing’s (RBH) agenda for the same reasons.

Housing associations have a central role to play in building the homes we need and challenging the attitudes that hold us back, Theresa May said in central London this week, as she announced new long-term funding for affordable housing.

As part of the Government’s commitment to transform housebuilding, the Prime Minister announced £2 billion in new funding to give housing associations the long-term certainty they need to deliver tens of thousands of new affordable and social homes.

As the first Prime Minister to address the National Housing Federation Summit, she pledged this morning to work in partnership with the associations to get more people on the housing ladder and make sure those who can’t afford their own place also have somewhere they’re proud to call home.

Total right to buy discounts have climbed to £1 billion a year – leading to a net loss of some £300 million, according to recent analysis from the Chartered Institute of Housing (CIH).

Cutting the discounts available could lead to an extra 12,000 homes being built a year, CIH has calculated. But the organisation says right to buy should be suspended altogether to stem the loss of social rented homes.

The extent of the cost to the public sector is revealed in the UK Housing Review 2018 Autumn briefing paper, launched earlier this month at Sheffield Town Hall.

Theresa May has announced that local councils will be able to borrow more money to fund housebuilding developments, in order to meet affordable housing targets.

The cap on funding applications for the Housing Revenue Account (HRA) will be scrapped, said the Prime Minister, helping people to get on the housing ladder by allowing councils to “build the homes this country needs”.

At the Conservative Party conference in Birmingham, Mrs May said, “Solving the housing crisis is the biggest domestic policy challenge of our generation. It doesn’t make sense to stop councils from playing their part in solving it.”

A housing tax overhaul including ending stamp duty on certain properties could rebalance the UK housing market and reignite activity across all tenures.

New figures show that nearly half of respondents to the RICS Residential Market Survey suggest using tax incentives to encourage downsizing, while making changes to Stamp Duty and Council Tax would help thousands more young people realise their dream of owning their own home.

Housing associations provide two and a half million homes for more than five million people. This infographic explores the importance of housing associations for society.