Logic of Tory "right to buy" BUY - OR ELSE!

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WANDSWORTH Council something of a pioneer: right up front in the scramble to drive us back to the Victorian era and beyond.

They have forged ahead with the privatisation of anything that Families desperate for a transfer from high-rise blocks, damp and squalid accommodation or vandalised estates will stand no chance of moving on.

The waiting list will grow. Mothers with small children will be forced to stay longer in bed and breakfast or temporary accommodation.

Already 4,000 properties have been sold off, the majority not to sitting tenants. Where on earth are the tenants in these "sales areas" who do not want or can't afford to buy their houses going to be "encouraged"" to transfer to?

And the prospect of cleansing these areas of awkward sitting tenants has a sinister ring to it. How soon will it be before this bright new policy turns into a "buy or else" ultimatum?

During the election, many of us became aware that the Tories' sales policy was an effective vote-winner - or more accurately vote-buyer. For individual workers the prospect of buying their homes at a massive discount, rather than paying for them ten times over in rent, does mean an immediate and substantial improvement in their general standard of life. It takes a lot of disinterested principle to say no to such a tempting offer.

However, for the Labour Party to reverse its policy on sales, as some on the woolly left have suggested in order to win back those votes would be criminal. « It would also, I think, be counter-productive. The problem lies not with the policy, which is as basic to any view of socialism as a free health or education service, but with how it was for wasn't) argued and Labour's rather murky history on housing.

We are not against council house sales on some moralistic rejection of any kind of private property. There's nothing wrong with individuals owning the home they live in. And there's a quite healthy side to working class people wanting to improve their living standards any way that is offered.

We oppose the our priority is to house the homeless and ensure everyone has an adequate place to live, before we give hand-outs to those who do have a roof (or two) over their heads.

Our counter to the Tories' policy should be for more housebuilding.

There would be little incentive for tenants to buy, were it not for the history of bureaucratic management, poor maintenance and services, and astronomical rents which council housing has entailed. Labour councils bear equal responsibility for that. In a sense, the Tory voting house-buyer is the pay-off for Labour councils' refusal to fight any more than half-heartedly for more funds from central government and to take the Tories head-on. • Wandsworth is indeed a pioneer and like those early pioneers bearing gifts of plague-ridden blankets to the Indians, this policy will poison our communities. There must be no retreat on Labour policy. We need to stop being defensive and build a strong campaign on our terms.