Why we must reform a social housing sector that is crying out for change.
Shelter and the campaign group Grenfell United are putting pressure on the Government to ensure the new Social Housing Regulation Bill really delivers promised improvements for social housing tenants. These reforms are well overdue.
I’m sure everyone in the sector can cite examples of bad practice, from poor quality housing stock to lack of effective, professional support for vulnerable tenants. On a positive note, there are some really encouraging moves around the country to tackle unsafe, inadequate housing, such as calls to strengthen the regulation and licencing of HMOs. The Shelter campaign lends weight to these demands and is an opportunity to push for real change that will safeguard tenants and protect local communities.
We have also had direct experience of the shark-infested waters of social housing provision. When we started out we rented shared houses from local private landlords, some with lived experience of addiction or mental health issues who genuinely wanted to help others move on. We also struck partnerships with large Registered Social Landlords and investors. But, as we grew, we also found we attracted the attention of unscrupulous investors looking for attractive returns from converting rental properties into housing benefit-funded HMOs. We had to quickly revise our somewhat naïve earlier view of ‘RSLs good, private landlords bad’: in such a lucrative market the interests of tenants were often ignored.
Supporting Shelter with their campaign to reform the Social Housing Regulation Bill.
So what is the solution? Shelter’s says the Social Housing Regulation Bill should incorporate regular Ofsted-style inspections of social homes and improve support for tenants by ensuring that housing management staff are properly trained and qualified.
Emerging Futures fully supports this aim. We may be a small fish in a big pond, but we take our responsibilities to provide high-quality, fully supported social housing very seriously. Our values-led approach includes recruiting senior housing specialists to ensure safe, professionally-managed, fully compliant properties that meet best practice standards, and equipping our staff to deliver high-quality, effective psychosocial interventions and practical support to our tenants.
We have also worked with Homeless Link to install In-Form, their online rent and property management system which enables us to build effective relationships with our tenants, service providers and contractors. In-Form supports us to deliver a rigorous regime of daily property and client welfare checks that promote health and safety and client wellbeing.
So, we fully endorse Shelter’s campaign and hope the Government will take this opportunity to truly reform and improve the regulation of social housing, strengthen social tenants’ rights and ensure better quality, safer homes that work for tenants and communities. Bring it on.
