A PROTEST will be held outside Liverpool Town Hall today after the city council backed out of a community housing project.

Since 2018, Homebaked Community Land Trust has been working to refurbish nine derelict properties in Anfield and bring them into community ownership.

It secured £520,000 to kickstart the final phase of work on Oakfield Road, which Homebaked says was conditional on the properties being transferred to its ownership from the council. 

But now the council has U-turned on the plans and included them on a list of properties to be sold on the open market.

Tom Murphy, co-ordinator at Homebaked Community Land Trust, told the Star that the U-turn was “out of the blue” and a “real insult” to the work that all the partners, including council officers, had put in to date.

“We’re urging them to protect the terrace and community ownership by adding it to their existing community-led housing programme,” he said.

Despite Homebaked securing more funding, Councillor Nick Small told the Liverpool Echo that the scheme is “not viable” without a “robust financial business case” and noted that their partner Your Housing Group withdrew its involvement.

But Mr Murphy hit back that the majority of the issues stem back to the council “not transferring the properties when we needed them to.”

“Which meant money that we had aligned had dropped away.” 

A protest is set to take place ahead of a cabinet meeting at 4pm, where a deal to sell the properties is expected to be agreed.