An interesting story that hasn't garnered too much attention appeared in The Observer yesterday. Housing Minister and eco-town proponent Caroline Flint, suggested that councils could buy houses and flats from homeowners struggling to pay their mortgages and rent it back to them.

Well, it's one potential answer to the shortage of housing stock. It would also keep roofs over people's heads and save large numbers of repossessions providing doom-and-gloom headlines. But it'll prove expensive for central government - I can't imagine councils have the spare funds to become landlords in this way and just the start-up costs might frighten the Treasury.

There is an awful lot of detail to fill in if this is going to develop further and the Government will want to avoid more u-turn headlines but is this really going to happen? It's a radical step but I have a feeling No11 might quietly put the kibosh on such an idea. Would the Government really be willing to accept short-term expenses for long-term rehousing costs?