A GOVERNMENT scheme to hand council tenants up to £75,000 to buy their homes will be a disaster for Swindon, a campaign group has warned.

The Swindon Tenants’ Campaign Group fears the town’s 13,000-strong waiting list will grow even longer under the initiative.

The Prime Minister unveiled a new version of Margaret Thatcher’s right-to-buy policy yesterday, announcing bigger discounts for buyers.

Demand is already outstripping supply in Swindon and work to enhance homes was postponed in January.

Martin Wicks, the campaign group’s spokesman, said: “This has been put together by a bunch of lunatics. How is it going to ease the housing crisis?

“It’s only going to exacerbate the problem as there is already a massive shortage of council housing and there is absolutely nothing being done to build new homes. I can’t understand why they are doing this, other than for electoral popularity.”

Swindon’s waiting list for council houses has risen to more than 13,000 people, including thousands who need urgent rehoming.

Some 1,183 households joined the queue last year, yet only 217 properties were made available under a national regeneration scheme.

Across England, 40 families are chasing every home, according to National Housing Federation statistics.

Mr Wicks said: “For each council house sold there will be one less piece of accommodation for people on the housing waiting list.

“The homes that are bought are going to be sold on privately or stay with the owners until they shuffle off the mortal coil.

“The sales will generate very little money for councils to replace housing on a one-on-one basis.

“They will only be able to spend 30 per cent of the receipt and a lot of councils will not have the money to do it.”

Council tenants in Swindon voted in January not to transfer their homes to an independent, not-for-profit housing association.

The local authority will have to borrow £140m under a self-financing system, which came into effect nationally on Sunday.

The money will be paid by the council to the Government as its share of the national housing debt.

Refurbishment of the town’s 10,500 homes has been postponed for up to 18 years or scrapped.

Swindon Council has admitted it cannot match demand for affordable housing, but says it has delivered 227 homes this financial year with another 126 scheduled for the next 12 months.

David Cameron pledged yesterday that the new scheme will replace an antiquated system of discounts and provide a ‘vital rung on the property ladder’.

“I want many more people to achieve the dream of home ownership,” he said.

“In the 80s, right to buy helped millions of people living in council housing to achieve their aspiration of owning their own home.

“It gave something back to families who worked hard, paid their rent and played by the rules. It allowed them to do up their home, change their front door, improve their garden – without getting permission from the council.

The new right-to-buy scheme will raise the maximum discount to £75,000 from the current limit of between £16,000 and £38,000.