Twelve housing associations were short-listed as potential winners of the Housing Corporation's Gold Award 2007. Now in its second year, the Corporation's popular national competition for housing associations has two new themes:
Each winning association will receive a prize of £50,000 to help fund their involvement in a 12-months programme of knowledge dissemination.
A record number of housing associations submitted bids to take part in the competition - over 40% more compared to the first year.
The short-listed entrants for the Empowering Communities theme are:
For the Environmental Sustainability theme, those short-listed were:
Each short-listed association will showcase their projects to a delegation of judges and experts during March. Up to three winning entries in each theme will be selected to receive one of the awards.
The winners will be announced at an awards ceremony in London on 24 May 2007.
The Housing Corporation set out a radical vision of a new regulatory system for social housing in England, based around a new relationship between housing providers and consumers.
In its response to the Cave Review of Social Housing Regulation, published on its website, the Corporation calls for:
A re-definition of the core purposes of a social housing provider, to reflect wider community needs, interests and concerns.
All social housing tenants to have the same tenancy rights, service level expectations and access to performance information, regardless of their social landlord.
A simplified registration system, open to both housing associations and other private sector providers.
Simplified and reduced regulatory requirements, with greater use of self-certification.
New rights for residents, including increased access to information on landlord performance, resident scrutiny committees, compensation for poor performance, and a new collective right to change housing manager.
Stronger powers of intervention when things go wrong.
Launching the response, Peter Dixon, Chairman of the Housing Corporation, said:
"Our existing regulatory system has successfully delivered for residents, housing associations and government over the last thirty years. But we now need to modernise that system if we are to meet the challenges identified in John Hills' report. That means more freedom for housing providers to innovate in their service delivery, more rights for residents and communities to hold landlords to account and a better deal for tax-payers. That is the vision we are mapping out today."
In addition, the Corporation calls for:
A new ability for local authorities to hold social landlords to account in relation to local concerns such as neighbourhood management and anti-social behaviour.
A new inspection framework, with larger providers commissioning their own externally validated inspections, including resident led inspection, rather than relying on periodic statutory inspection.
A new explicit statutory role for the regulator to deliver efficiency and control rents.
Incentives for registered bodies to endow residents' groups with assets to develop community ownership and services.
The Corporation explicitly rejects calls for a system built mainly on self-regulation, as insufficient to protect resident and tax-payer interests. However, it outlines an expanded role for self-certification of performance within the new regulatory framework.
The Housing Corporation and Audit Commission further strengthened their working relationship by agreeing a new Memorandum of Understanding (MoU). This is the third MoU between the two organisations since the Commission took over responsibility for the inspection of housing associations, in April 2003. It has been prompted by the review, chaired by Sir Les Elton, of the regulatory and compliance requirements on housing associations.
The MoU sets out how the two organisations will work together in regulating and inspecting housing associations. It outlines their arrangements for the management of their respective roles and responsibilities, as well as the key principles that will underpin their relationship.
For the first time, the MoU is supported by an annual work plan that describes the programme of joint work that has been agreed for 2007/8, in order to deliver the commitments set out in the MoU. It also details the priorities that have been applied to determine which associations are inspected in the forthcoming programme.
Housing Corporation Director of Regulation, Clare Miller, said:
"The Corporation and the Commission share a commitment to driving performance and increased efficiency within the housing association sector. We want to ensure that we get the very best from our resources through better targeting of our work and by working in partnership."
Roy Irwin, Chief Inspector of Housing for the Audit Commission, said:
"The Commission and the Corporation are committed to improving services provided by housing associations. This commitment is further cemented by the publication of the annual work plan setting out how we will meet our strategic objectives."
Copies of the memorandum can be found at www.housingcorp.gov.uk, or www.auditcommission.gov.uk.
An Audit Commission inspection report released during February 2007 concludes that Golden Gates Housing (Warrington Council ALMO) provides an excellent three-star service with excellent prospects for improvement.
The report highlights some key strengths in the service including:
Customer-focused access arrangements are supported by an effective interactive website and telephone systems.
A sustained focus on diversity has ensured that this is embedded and reflected in all aspects of service delivery for customers.
Its lettings, rents, supported housing, asset management, estate and tenancy services, and the repairs delivery are of high quality.
Performance on gas servicing is an area of significant strength.
Leasehold management is good with a focus on customer information and involvement.
There is a strong focus on delivering value for money across all services, which is delivering efficiency savings across the organisation.
Customer involvement is strong and well developed and is delivering clear outcomes for customers.
The report highlights a number of issues that need to be tackled, including:
A backlog of non-priority (non-medical) adaptations, a substantial waiting list and weak performance in completing adaptations on time.
Limited cyclical works being undertaken and policies and procedures for rechargeable repairs are not fully implemented.
Performance on collection of leaseholder service charge areas is weak.
No systematic tenancy audits.
Golden Gates Housing owns and manages approximately 9,000 homes with 219 leaseholders. The Housing Revenue Account capital budget for 2006/07 is £16.8 million.
Rutland council tenants are getting a poor service from their landlord, but there are promising prospects for improvement, according to another report released by the Audit Commission during February. The inspection team gave the Council's Landlord Services a poor zero-star rating.
The report highlights a number of areas for improvement, such as:
A significant proportion of repairs, including emergency repairs, are not completed within the target time.
It takes too long for vacant properties to be repaired and re-let.
There is a lack of customer information and few clear service standards.
Good practice guidance, such as the Commission for Racial Equality's Code of Practice for Rented Housing, is not followed.
There are some clearly inefficient ways of working, which do not represent value for money.
The report also highlights some service strengths:
There is a range of ways for residents to be involved, and residents' satisfaction with these opportunities and interest in them has increased.
The housing stock is in generally good condition.
Tenant satisfaction is high.
Rutland County Council owns 1,221 homes, which, since February 2006, have been managed by Spire Homes, a registered social landlord. Spire Homes provide housing management and homelessness services for the Council and manages the housing maintenance contracts.
An Audit Commission report released during February 2007 finds that Tower Homes delivers an excellent three-star service, which has excellent prospects for improvement. The Association is the first in London, and only the second in the country, to receive the maximum three stars rating for its housing service (the other was West Kent HA).
Audit Commission inspectors found:
A customer-focused service: the Association is easy to contact, staff are helpful and there are high levels of customer satisfaction.
Well managed and maintained properties and schemes.
Good performance in rent arrears, speed of shared ownership sales and customer satisfaction.
Work with local and national government is providing sustainable housing that meets local needs.
The clear strategic plans in place are likely to improve the service further.
Staff are well led and trained, and are highly motivated.
To help the service improve, inspectors made a number of recommendations:
Improve consultation with residents about the services they receive.
Ensure compliance with the Disability Equality Duty.
Ensure value for money of services is assessed.
Tower Homes is a subsidiary of the London and Quadrant Group. It specialises in the development of low-cost home ownership housing and products. The Association is based in SE London and currently manages 3,700 properties and over 3,000 equity loans.
The housing service provided by Gloucestershire Housing Association is poor but has promising prospects of improvement, according to an independent report released by the Audit Commission. On a scale from zero to three stars, the Audit Commission inspection team gave the service a zero-star rating.
The inspectors found:
Overall satisfaction among tenants is low and resident involvement is limited in some areas.
Customer access can be difficult.
Performance in a number of key areas is weak, for example in the areas of responsive repairs and re-letting empty homes.
Progress on equality and diversity issues has been slow.
The report also notes some positive aspects of the service. These include a developing approach to resident involvement and an effective approach to antisocial behaviour.
To help the service improve, inspectors made a number of recommendations. These include:
Improve the access and customer care arrangements, for example, by ensuring that all the information produced is clear and uses plain language.
Effectively manage risk to the organisation, for example, by ensuring there are effective systems in place to carry out safety checks to tenants' homes.
Improve the Association's approach to value for money, for example, by regularly testing the service's value for money.
Gloucestershire Housing Association is the largest traditional registered social landlord operating in Gloucestershire. It works principally in Gloucestershire and neighbouring counties and currently has 2,810 owned or leased homes (including bed spaces).
Other Audit Commission housing association inspection reports released during the month of February included:
L&Q Beacon Homes:
One-star fair service with promising prospects for improvement.
Mosscare Housing: