Howie said>
The majority of the properties affected were owned by private landlords or housing associations. There has been studies conducted that suggest the properties could have been brought up to modern day standards for less than the cost of the demolition let alone the rebuild>.

Howie, i am not sure where you get your information but thats certainly not correct. I have sat on many boards (housing association and council). And every time its not cost efficient to do them up. We have learnt the hard way over the years investing in old housing stock. There are that many regulations which year on year seem to change some eec directive some towards carbon emissions. What will you hear on the television in the next six months, well, community centers, brownfield site regeneration, ( tax consessions on brownfield sites) Parking an over all factor of modern day life and not victorian housing stock which has no secure parking. People dont want back alleys, they have told us so, they the community call them "rat runs", To do up old housing stock, you have to look at the whole community. have you heard of the decent homes standard? go read it and not to mention the building regulations which would have to be aheard to to bring old stock back into limited use. victorian houses were good in there day, Modern Housing stock if built to specification has great thermal value, smaller in size footprint more houses per sq footage than the old victorian stock. People want houses that are economical to run, have secure parking and a bit of a garden.
kat