Independent Riots, Communities & Victims Panel suggests riots could happen again.

“The riots will happen again if urgent action is not taken.”

That is the stark warning from the independent Riots Communities and Victims Panel’s interim report published last week. Following its wide-ranging research the Panel conclude that riots of this nature will happen again, therefore immediate action is needed if this is to be prevented.

Key findings & recommendations

The Panel finds and recommends that:

1. People felt abandoned by the police in many areas.

Recommendation: The Police need to ensure they achieve the right balance in prioritising the protection of people and residential areas over commercial property in tackling riots.

2 Residents were forced into the streets after their homes were set alight. Some people were forced off buses into riot areas.

Recommendation: Local authorities and emergency services should review their processes for how to assist and/or evacuate residents and bystanders caught up in riot areas, including through designating particular sites ‘safe havens’.

3. Many people told the Panel that police stop and search was consistently carried out without courtesy.

Recommendation: Stop and Search needs immediate attention to ensure that community support and confidence is not undermined.

4. The police could not control the disorder in many areas.

Recommendation: Police authorities should immediately review their emergency plans to ensure they properly cover public disorder on the scale of the August riots.

5. Convicted rioters pose a risk of re-offending.

Recommendation: Clear plans from public services, including the probation service, youth offending teams and local government to deal with the return of rioters are needed to cut the potential for re-offending and to safeguard communities.

6. Victims should be able to confront rioters.

Recommendation: Central and local government and the police should make sure all victims who want to face people who committed crimes against them can have the opportunity do so.

7. The Riot Damages Act is not working. The Panel did not hear of anyone who had received a payment under the Act.

Recommendation: Unblock the Riots Damages Act system and make sure that victims of the riots receive compensation quickly.

8. Insurers are letting victims down.

Recommendation: Prompt the insurance industry to root out the cases where service has been poor and to make sure that customers who are facing severe trauma are dealt with effectively.

9. Footfall remains seriously down in some riot hit high streets.

Recommendation: The Government should start a fund to support struggling high streets, including using any potential under spend from the various support schemes to provide extra help.

10. Many emergency service staff risked their lives during the riots.

Recommendation: Honour the service personnel who protected communities at great risk to themselves

Next steps for the Panel

In the next phase of its work the Panel have committed to look more at the role of parenting, how to make young people more resilient and help them back into work, and to explore how brands can contribute to communities.

• All information has been extracted from the SLCNG Bulletin No 379
• Photo courtesy of  Tom Curtis at Digital Photos.net

By Paul Johns

New twist on social housing eviction for ASB

Image by johnmuk via Flickr

The Government has launched its new housing strategy today; a repackaged mix of old measures and new money to get more homes built. The headline-grabbing measures included;

• “pay to stay” proposals for high earners in social housing (an estimated 6,000 tenants earn over £100,000)
• A  400 million pound building fund, to create 16,000 homes
• A 500 million pound infrastructure fund
• A further £50 million to councils to bring more empty homes into use
• Right-to-buy discounts for council tenants, with the money released to be spent on new social housing
• Underwriting first time buyer’s mortgages for up to 95%

Whilst the Government plans for a building boom, they have also found time to tackle badly-behaved social tenants. Buried in the small print of the document, the Coalition plans to “widen the grounds on which landlords can seek to evict tenants, to include where they or members of their household have been convicted of the sort of criminality see in the recent rioting, wherever that took place .”  Up until this point, anti-social behavior outside of the tenant’s local area did not count. Now it does.

In one way, the Government’s hard-line approach is welcome. As our hot-spotting tracker on Google Maps can demonstrate, ASB is rarely confined to one street or estate. It’s just as easy to transport bad behavior to the town centre as the local park. In the past, ASB was seen as a civil matter, with little police involvement. However, with increased data sharing and best practice (see Mike’s article on the West Mercia seminar), this is changing. ASB is now seen as a criminal matter, to be dealt with at a local level by the newly elected Police Commissioners.

The danger is that the “fast track” approach does not give problem families enough breathing space to turn over a new leaf. A wayward teenager could quickly see their Friday night activity turn into a criminal conviction and a threat to the family home. (Remember the Government’s consultation on mandatory powers of possession for landlords, when tenants are convicted of ASB?). Turning such behaviour around requires time and energy, as the Family Intervention Project in Sandwell can testify.

Interestingly enough, the Government has not imposed any new regulations on private landlords, citing an 85% satisfaction rate from tenants.

By Natalie Phillips   

Related articles

• Police seminar on ASB trials (reactasb.wordpress.com)

Neighbourhood Resolution Panels

Previously known as Restorative Justice Panels theses are being actively promoted by the Ministry of Justice with a call for expressions of interest in a pilot programme attracting 35 applications. The pilots are due to start in January next year but, surprise, surprise there is no money available.

Recently I was fortunate to listen to a presentation by Val Keitch of the International Institute for Restorative Practices UK Office (IIRP UK is the shortened version). Val also runs the very successful South Somerset Restorative Justice Panel based at Yarlington Homes head office in Yeovil. Val is an inspirational and very busy lady who has an amazing c.v. and who is currently setting up a Panel in Sheffield. After hearing of the amazing success rate and satisfaction survey results of the South Somerset initiative I am definitely a fan of the principle of Restorative Justice. It is being suggested that, properly funded and organised, Panels could well replace magistrate’s courts for certain offences! Is this the Big Society and Localism actually at work or is it more about cost saving?

Look out for a soon to be published report on the South Somerset Panel and I will be sharing and commenting on key findings in the report in a future blog.

More info at www.iirp.org./uk or http://www.southsomerset.gov.uk/community-safety/get-involved/community-justice-panel

By Mike Blomer.

Families, funding, riots and budgets; the latest Government announcements

Image by James Cridland via Flickr

Social Landlords Crime & Nusiance Group sends out regular bulletins to their members. We requested their permission to publish this one, as the public policy announcments on rioters, problem families and gang culture will affect us all.

Government response to ‘riots’

 Amongst the intense media reporting of last month’s riots and what the Government’s response should be  arereports that Louise Casey has been asked by David Cameron to lead on how the Government should intervene with Families at Risk.

The Spectator, for example, has it that DCLG will take sole charge of the government’s proposed family-intervention programme and it is anticipated that Ms. Casey will be appointed to help communities secretary Eric Pickles deal with the 120,000 families of most concern.

In her speech to the Police Superintendents Association earlier this week, the Home Secretary signalled a clear intention on the part of government to apply interventionist approaches to deal with the ‘gang culture’ thought to have played a significant role in the August ‘riots’: the Home Secretary said:

“The riots also provided us with a reminder of the importance of doing much more to deal with gangs and gang culture. The Met currently believe that around one in five rioters and looters were linked to gangs. And more than three quarters of those charged had previous convictions.

 Together with Iain Duncan Smith, I am now leading work across government to look at how we can tackle each and every stage of the gang ‘life-cycle’. That means starting by preventing young people joining gangs in the first place; diverting them away from gangs if they are tempted to join; disrupting gang activity; tough enforcement of the law against gang crime; and forcing gang members to take responsibility for their actions and to repair the damage done.

We are going around the country, talking to police forces and other agencies about the problems and best practice in solving them. We will publicly set out our plans by the end of October.”

Funding for preventive and intensive intervention dissemination hubs

The Government wants to set up 10 ‘Dissemination Hubs’ around the country, using clusters of Local Authorities and other partners willing to work and learn together.

Hubs will be a centre to develop local partners as learning organisations, absorbing and acting on the evidence on the outcomes and cost effectiveness of early, preventive and intensive intervention to support families with multiple problems (FwMP).

The objective is to increase the quantity and quality of family intervention services by disseminating to practitioners, service managers, strategic directors and lead members the evidence about what works in family intervention, and the big cost savings that local authorities and their partners can make, over time, by using early and intensive intervention with FwMP – saving money on children going into care, re-housing, fewer court cases, less anti-social behaviour, fewer workless households, etc.

Ideally, hubs will be geographically dispersed and take on a theme as well as a geographic responsibility. Each successful area will receive grant of £50,000 this year and next year.

Further information has been posted on the Department for Education’s website – please follow this link.  

Community Budget Seminars

Warwick Business School is understood to be running 4 seminars as part of its Local Government Consortium work. They are to take place in three phase 1 Community Budget areas, – Leicestershire, Birmingham, and Coventry – and will showcase some of their work with families with multiple problems. The dates for and the focus of each of the seminars are understood to be:

• Leicestershire October 6 – what works well.
• Birmingham October 14 – use of the Family CAF
• Tameside November 14 – very local level budgets
• Coventry TBC for early 2012 – the learning partnership across Coventry, Solihull and Warwickshire.

Places are free but limited and will be allocated on a ‘first come, first served’ basis. Contact Irene.Chinnock@wbs.ac.uk by September 28 to book a place.

Free Community Budgets Leaders Event – 17 October 2011

The Deputy Prime Minister had previously announced plans to roll out Community Budgets more widely with 50 more authorities being signed up by the end of this year and a further 60 during 2012-2013.

In furtherance of this initiative a free event is being held in London to update delegates on the next phase of Community Budgets, including “how to improve the lives of 120,000 families with complex needs, and provide an opportunity to debate and discuss key issues.”

The event is aimed at Council Leaders, Cabinet members, Chief Executives, and their partners, who would be interested in one or more aspects of Community Budgets. The event is free to LGA members but there may be a £100 (ex VAT) charge to non LGA members. Follow this link for more information and the booking form.  

With thanks and acknowledgements to Eamon Lynch.

Related articles

• UK riots: Cameron kicks off social policy review (guardian.co.uk)

Tenant complaints and the new Localism Bill

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The Housing Ombudsman has raised concerns about the Government’s plans to bar direct complaints from tenants. The Localism Bill (which was passed by the House of Lords on Thursday) insists that tenants will need to go through MPs or councillors first – who may have vested interests in preventing the complaint progressing. Unfortunately, the House of Lords threw out the amendment allowing tenants to complain to the Ombudsman directly.

Direct access to the Ombudsman is taken for granted in other consumer areas, such as telephone, banking and insurance. For something as essential as tenancy rights, surely this should also be the case. As tenancy groups (and article commentators) point out, each housing association has a slightly different way of dealing with complaints, from tenant panels and representatives through to formal management reviews. Adding yet another layer to the process threatens to both increase costs and the amount of time taken to resolve the complaint.

Social landlords accountability has risen enormously in recent years; often for the better. Unfortunately, this Bill could be a step backwards, both for speed, transparency and fairness.

Related articles

• Tenants’ complaints: another hurdle to jump (redbrickblog.wordpress.com)

By Natalie Phillips

Home Office announces £14 million fund

Home Office announces £14 million fund to tackle crime. Voluntary organisations & local groups invited to apply. http://ow.ly/5JN2N

Home Office cuts ASB team in half

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The Home Office is slashing the number of people who work in its anti-social behaviour team by half.

The 14-strong team has been reduced to seven members following staff restructuring at the department, coming at a busy time for the team, which is carrying out a review of ASB powers that began in July last year.

ASB overhaul: the proposals

• Criminal behaviour order available on conviction for any criminal offence
• Crime prevention injunction a civil order
• Police direction power a power to direct any individual away from a specified place
• Community protection order (level 1) a notice to stop persistent anti-social behaviour that is affecting quality of life in an area
• Community protection order (level 2) a local authority/ police power to restrict use of a property

Eamon Lynch, managing director of the Social Landlords’ Crime and Nuisance Group, said: ‘The Home Office anti-social behaviour unit has just been sliced in half. I don’t know why this has happened right in the middle of major reform – it just seems a very odd time. We have asked for the funding [for these posts] to be continued but this was politely declined.’

The review seeks to reduce the number of powers available to the police and landlords from 18 to just five. Social landlords have been asked to identify ASB ‘hotspots’ as part of the consultation.

According to ‘Inside Housing’ The Home Office refused to comment on personnel issues. A spokesperson said: ‘ASB is a priority for this government as set out in the coalition document and the Home Office business plan.’

By Paul Johns

Cashbacks for house proud tenants

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A new pilot project has been launched to give tenants the opportunity to get stuck in and become proud tenants of their own homes; by taking responsibility for small DIY jobs around the homes, tenants could save money for their landlords and reap the benefits of a “tenant cashback” scheme.

Surely this will encouraging people to acquire new skills or even find something that they enjoy doing, whether it’s dealing with leaking taps or changing locks, it could make a difference and get the repair fixed much quicker. An average of £1,000 is spent on repairs in each council property, if tenants could help a little by saving time on call out visits and repairs; the money could be spent on other resources that will hopefully be of benefit to them in the long run too.

Hastoe Housing and Home Group are the two pilots trialling this; if it was to be drawn out throughout the UK, individual landlords would be in control of the finer details of “tenant cashback” offer. The National Housing Federation said the idea was worth testing and welcomed pilot schemes with two landlords, whether or not this will be approved and rolled out to other housing associations, the incentive on offer would hopefully make tenants want to look after their homes more and perhaps enjoy making small changes of their own. It has been stressed that only ‘routine’ DIY would be carried out by tenants, leaving the major issues to the landlords repair departments.

Would you want to adopt this in your organisations? I would be interested to hear your thoughts.

By Kate Hill

Related Articles

• Social tenants ‘paid to do DIY’ (bbc.co.uk)

Delivering services for the vulnerable

As we all know the Risk Assessment Matrix has been enforced to measure individual’s vulnerability and make informed decisions based on individual scores with up to date information. The purpose is to identify those who need additional support and be proactive in making more services accessible, thus including housing options.

In the past, the waiting lists for social housing have crept up and up and up, perhaps leaving vulnerable people in a vacant situation; however, yesterday it was announced that social landlords are now being asked to provide tenancy policies to inform the public how they propose to look after and house the more vulnerable individuals and families. Does this mean we will see and hear waiting lists decrease in number or will the vulnerable people add to the already long lists? Who will get a tenancy first, the vulnerable or those in need of a home?

A consultation document was published last autumn which suggested that social landlords offer fixed-term tenancies rather than life time agreements; the minimum fixed-term being two years according to Grant Shapps, housing minister’s announcement yesterday. This consultation document attracted over 700 responses from housing associations and local authorities pointing out that they would be offering fixed-term tenancies, probably longer than the minimum two years.

Shapps completed his statement saying “We cannot sit idly by and watch as people simply join the back of the queue – urgent reform is needed to make sure as many people as possible benefit from the support that social housing offers.”

This raises many questions about timeframes and priority lists, although we have the risk assessments in place now I’m sure that each social landlord will take a slightly different approach; I would be interested to hear how you work with, and prioritise vulnerable individuals and families.

By Kate Hill

ASB Consultation Launch

Image by wili_hybrid via Flickr

The Government’s consultation has been launched on the premise that the existing tools for tackling ASB hinder more than help the authorities and housing groups.  There is also a concern that behaviour is not addressed at an early stage, before it reaches the severity of a criminal offence.

“Where the behaviour is criminal, it should be dealt with as such. But informal measures can nip problems in the bud before they get that far.”

The government’s review found that:

• there are simply too many tools – with practitioners tending to stick to the ones they are most familiar with;
• some of the formal tools (particularly the ASBO) are bureaucratic, slow and expensive, which puts people off using them;
• the growing number of people who breach their ASBO suggests the potential consequences are not deterring a persistent minority from their anti-social or criminal behaviour; and
• the tools that were designed to help perpetrators deal with underlying causes of their anti-social behaviour are rarely used.

The consultation proposes a simplified toolkit, with three types of Orders that prevents ASB with the threat of targeted punishments (e.g. eviction from social housing). The “criminal behaviour order” is designed to prevent future anti social behaviour after a conviction, whilst the “crime prevention injunction”  can tackle behaviour in the civil courts, offering a lower burden of proof. The “community protection orders”, by contrast, focus on areas, rather than people, addressing problems of prostitution or loud noise.

Informal justice and rehabilitation is encouraged for smaller offences, to prevent the problem escalating. There is also a discussion of a “community trigger”, giving victims the right to require agency action after frequent complaints about ASB. 

Table 1 illustrates the proposals to streamline the existing framework

Table 2 illustrates how the key elements of the proposed new ‘toolkit’ would fit together. The consultation points  out that this is not an ‘escalator’ – i.e. practitioners would need to choose the most appropriate approach for the behaviour in question. The intention is to provide “a clearer path of consequences and sanctions for those who consistently fail to change their behaviour.

The consultation is open until 03 May 2011. The full consultation document can be found at: http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/asb-consultation. Proposals will affect England and (where relevant) Wales only.

With grateful acknowledgements to Eamon Lynch at Social Landlords Crime & Nuisance Group. This information was taken from Members Bulletin 287.

 By Natalie Phillips