Council house rent arrears were running at £1.4 million in 2000.

Now, five years later, these rent arrears have escalated to a staggering £3.7 million, indirectly placing increased strain on Brighton and Hove's taxpayers.

As if this news is not bad enough, we learn Brighton and Hove City Council will need £119 million to repair and improve the city's 13,000 council properties (council audit report 2005) as only half of council housing meets the decent homes standard.

It gets worse.

The report continues: "A further £50 million will be needed for other essential work and another £26 million to make adaptations and environmental improvements."

Incredibly, Councillor Warren Morgan (Letters, August 9) says: "I have respect for colleagues who argue ... getting more taxpayers' money from the Government to fund improvements to homes is one which should be pursued."

Why on earth should taxpayers continually be asked to bail out the council when it is clearly unable to properly manage its council housing stock?

If the private landlord falls below the decent homes standard, the council immediately issues official notices threatening fines of up to £5,000 and/or prison.

Yet we discover from the report that almost all council homes with gas now require servicing and unbelievably 417 do not have a legal gas safety certificate, thus placing these tenants at a real safety risk.

No wonder the council and the Government want to rid themselves of this perennial problem and transfer it to housing associations. And as a taxpayer, I hope this proceeds quickly.

-Charles Holcombe, Kemp Town