COUNCIL tenants in Bournemouth have hit out at the introduction of new charges as “underhand”.

From the end of the month, Bournemouth council will charge its tenants extra for services including maintaining communal areas and heating on top of the existing rent.

However, one tenant has hit out at the council for using the new charges to get around government-legislated decreases in council housing rent.

In 2015, the then-chancellor George Osborne announced plans to force social rents to be cut by one percent for four years through to 2020.

Earlier this year, Bournemouth council’s cabinet agreed to introduce new service charges to cover the cost of maintenance work which had previously been included in tenants’ rent.

Bob Way, a council tenant who will not be affected by the new charges, said: “This is just an underhand way to get around not being able to put up rent.

“Although it will have no impact on me it will have a huge affect on other tenants across Bournemouth.

“These are all services which should be included in the normal rent payments.”

Thousands of households across the borough will now face having to pay the new charges from the end of this month when new tenancy agreements come into force.

A consultation was run by the council over the summer but Mr Way said that the documents sent out were so complicated that people wouldn’t have realised what was being proposed.

Seamus Doran, Bournemouth council tenancy services manager, said that some of the planned charges were dropped following feedback from residents and that others would be introduced in phases.

“We have carried out an extensive consultation with our tenants over the last 12 months regarding the introduction of charges for services such as communal gardening and cleaning.

"During this period tenants were provided with a number of opportunities to comment.

"Following the consultation, we reduced the number of new charges that we had intended to introduce and plan to phase the remaining ones in over a number of years.

"We also agreed to cap the amount that tenants would have to pay and this will remain in place until 2023/24."

He added that the additional income for the council would help it fund the provision of new homes in the borough.

“The charges are eligible for housing benefit and universal credit and our rental charges will remain affordable in comparison to rents charged elsewhere,” he added.

“Most social landlords have similar charges and we will continue to work with tenants to ensure that these are reasonable and that the services we provide represent value for money.”