Harlow Council set to repaint every home in Harlow thanks to record investment
Harlow Council / Thu 5th Mar 2026 at 07:40am
HARLOW Council has announced a major new programme to repaint council homes – marking the first large‑scale initiative of its kind in almost three decades.
The new programme is part of the council’s proposed 2026 budget, which sets out a record £179 million of investment in council housing over the next year. The programme will help modernise homes, improve the appearance of entire streets, and support long‑term neighbourhood, with the exterior of every council property that has waited years set to be repainted.
The programme will be prioritised based on how long homes have been waiting for a repaint with places like the Milwards estate set to benefit.
Announcing the plan, Councillor Dan Swords, Leader of the Council emphasised the significance of restarting a long‑abandoned tradition of painting the town’s historic council housing stock.
“For many years, Harlow had a proud tradition of regularly repainting its council homes as part of a rolling programme. Nearly thirty years ago that stopped, and whole streets were left to weather and fade. That chapter ends now.
“This new programme will finally give tenants the freshly painted homes they deserve. It’s about restoring pride not just in individual properties, but in entire neighbourhoods. Most importantly, it sends a clear message to our tenants: your home matters.
“Repainting is just one part of a much wider plan to invest in our housing and renew our neighbourhoods as we Build Harlow’s Future.”
Ends
Rox
2026-03-05 07:47:52
Milwards flats need knocking down and re building not re painting! They are damp, mouldy and falling apart. Give it a year they’ll look rotten again, be a complete waste of money.
Nicholas Taylor
2026-03-05 09:35:52
This is an issue which the Harlow Residents Alliance has taken up with the Council for about six years. In the distant past the Council repaired and painted the exterior of it's homes every five years. In the 1990's, a town wide programme to install plastic windows and doors meant that the cycle was extended to every seven years but since the early 200'0's the programme was abandoned, indeed a house near mine was last painted 26 years ago. On questioning councillors it transpired that less than 300 house were being repaired and painted each year. Todays announcement is long overdue and is to be very welcomed. One can hardly expect a tenant to carry out such work or indeed look after it, when the Council has failed to do it's bit for decades. As for the Milwards flats, I think the problems there are far deeper than a coat of paint will resolve.
Peter Henegan
2026-03-05 10:18:30
Given that council and private homes are so intertwined in many areas, should Harlow offer a deal to private owners to also paint their homes. It would give the council extra income whilst helping to maintain the overall appearance of the town. We have seen from the acquisition of the Harvey Centre that the council is not adverse to commercial deals.
John C
2026-03-05 13:43:59
Is it every home? Or only homes that have been waiting more than 5 years? The video contradicts itself; it says, "We're going to be painting every council home in Harlow. So, any council home that's been waiting more than five years now to be repainted (...) are now going to be repainted", so not every home?
nogin the nog
2026-03-05 16:37:04
no good Harlow council macking this anocment thinking thay should be getting a pat on the back .its what there supposed to do and wy haven't thay.
Eddie
2026-03-05 18:12:31
Paint your own house you lazy git PH
Jazzy
2026-03-05 18:59:13
@rox sorry to hear that I live in a Harlow house in Milwards and can't say I see any of those mouldy issues, even done a survey which found no damp or mould.
Mr George
2026-03-05 22:33:08
So covering a car park with millions of pounds of decorative rust and now painting homes. There's a lot wrong with Harlow, and while it's great to revamp it, I can't help but think this isn't high up on the list of priorities to spends so much on right now. And how can Harlow afford all this stuff? Are we saddling future generations with huge debts?
Tim smith
2026-03-06 01:13:27
More promises that will never get delivered, I have a idea, promise something you can deliver instead of making loads of big headlines that will never happen, i remember loads of promises of council flats getting investment in the past that never happened, Harlow council is about as useless as they come.
Jeff
2026-03-06 06:22:33
@jazzy. Are you joking? EVERY block of flats in milwards has a mouldy damp covering of render , can clearly see it just by walking past. They will be condemned once they start peeling back …mark my words
Colleen Morrison
2026-03-06 06:27:53
Nicholas Taylor, I agree with you when you state that "the Council has failed to do it's bit for decades". Though, having inspected c 75% of Harlow for our Conservative Council and having recorded what an appalling state Harlow was in after c 30 years of Labour controlled councils, I would put it much stronger than that. The truth is that c 30 years of Labour controlled Councils - from 1973 to 2011 and from 2012 to 2021 and leading a Labour/Lib Dem coalition from 2002 to 2007 shamefully and disgracefully neglected Harlow.
Colleen Morrison
2026-03-06 06:36:17
When our Conservative Council was elected in 2021, it inherited an appallingly neglected town, with a huge backlog of neglected housing repairs, a huge backlog of neglected maintenance and redecoration work, a huge backlog of neglected neighbourhood and greenspace landscaping. Harlow's neighbourhood landscaping, green spaces, trees and hedges were so appallingly neglected, overgrown and colonised by brambles, nettles and weeds that Harlow looked like the great bramble patches in scenes from the Day Of The Triffids.
Colleen Morrison
2026-03-06 07:01:22
To their great credit, Council Leader Dan Swords and his team of hard working councillors worked and our hard working HTS staff worked long to restore Harlow and they understandably first prioritised clearing the huge backlog of housing repairs and cutting back and restoring our overgrown neighbourhood landscaping, greenspaces, trees and hedges. Someone remind me, please, was it 27,000 Harlow trees alone, neglected for decades, too many of them diseased and untreated, that had to be inspected and have remedial work? Harlow Conservative Council also began a programme of building badly needed new homes for the people of Harlow, which will also provide the money required to properly restore and regenerate our town. Harlow looks so much better now than it did for decades under Labour Councils. We should remember which council did the work and which council did not when we vote in May this year.
Colleen Morrison
2026-03-06 07:32:37
Dan Swords and our Conservative Council were also the first Harlow Council to recognise that Harlow has an interrelated infestation of algae and microplastics. Algae excretes enzymes which break down plastics and turn them into microplastic mush, algae then can use the carbons in plastic's polymers to fuel its growth and reproduction and the microplastics end up in our environment, our food chain and in every organ in our bodies, even in mother's milk. Algae, when dead looks like mould, and this was colonising and destroying our plastic street and road signs, much of our our plastic street furniture, the plasticised cladding of some of our flats and the polymers and plastics in the binders of paint (such as alkyd, acrylic, epoxy, and polyurethanes) which our councils had been using for decades. It has been used on many of Harlow's homes, including those at Milwards. To his great credit, Council Leader Dan Swords took the decision to remove plastics from Harlow and to replace them with algae proof materials: that removal programme is ongoing. Milwards will be benefitting from this. Thank you, Dan.
Jazzy
2026-03-06 10:27:36
@Jeff hi Jeff- as stated I can't see any mould in a milwards Harlow house my family and I live in, as explained by Colleen above it may not be mould hopefully on those flats but if it is I'm happy to accept, not disputing with you at all if I'm wrong. However I'm no pro- conservative, more of a labour man (probably greens now lol); but the work that Dan-man is doing is commendable and I say this as an outsider, I'm born/from London moved here 2 years ago.
Tony
2026-03-06 12:37:19
Can they start a program on gutter repairs at the same time. People do look up my neighbors gutter has needed Repairing for at least 10 years which has had a knock on affect on my property. Start looking up not just which is in eye view. And yes would be interested if council offered service to home owner's 😉🤔
Eddie
2026-03-06 17:06:20
I can't believe what I am reading from 2 of these posts. Everyone moans about the council and hts being useless , then you want them to maintain the property you own. Why should they , they have enough to do with they own housing stock.
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