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Pennine axes aerial scheme
A £1.2 million scheme to help some of Pennine Housing tenants get a better TV signal has been consigned to the dustbin.
Technical, legal and planning problems have confounded the scheme and could leave some families with blank screens when the digital switchover takes place next year.
Pennine embarked on a huge project to install digital aerials with the best of intentions, said chief executive Tom Miskell.
Communal aerials on properties in Hebden Bridge and Todmorden have already been replaced to the satisfaction of most tenants.
Aerials were also installed for the first time on low rise blocks of properties in the Upper Calder Valley enabling an extra 400 properties to receive a digital signal.
The change over was not made optional so that the accompanying 75p a week service charge would be eligible for housing benefit.
But the installation contract has now been terminated following a complaint from a tenant in Halifax, who told the Courier he did not want to be forced to pay for a Pennine aerial.
As a result Pennine has agreed to maintain the aerials in properties which have always had them but will not maintain them in homes which have access to them for the first time.
Mr Miskell said that in the next few months, the council would be disconnecting the old analogue aerials.
"There are about 375 tenants who will lose their TV reception because they haven't allowed access to their homes for the digital aerial work to be completed.
"But the turn off will be staggered and these tenants will be given a last chance to enable this to take place."
Ditching the scheme has cost Pennine more than 40,000 and it will lose 22,000 a year from service charges it will no longer be making.
The tenant who did not want to be named said: "It has now been established that tenants have an absolute right to choose whether or not they want a communal aerial installed and such choice does not allow Pennine to recoup service charges from Housing Benefits."
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Saturday 04 February 2012
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