Communities Working Together

Do empty homes affect your community? Are you struggling to get your communities to work together? Andrew Stunnel, the Communities Minister, has announced that some of the ‘Empty Homes Fund’ will be available for community groups to help bring empty homes back into use again. There are 720,000 empty properties in England according to the campaign group Empty Homes, a lot of work could be done to make a dent in this number.

The allocation fund of £100 million was open to housing providers for a period of time and the bidding closed yesterday. As a result of this, community groups will benefit from anything between 10 and 30% of the total fund over a three-year period. Community groups do not have to become registered providers to be allocated the money; this is part of The Community Grant Programme, which will allow groups to apply.

If you are thinking of helping community groups and feel there is a need to get empty houses back up and running, this could be something to apply for. It is thought that the bidding will run up until the end of March; the exact funding will not be decided until the demand is seen.

Here’s a tip to think about – if you or anyone around you is thinking of bidding, those who offer training and employment opportunities within the local community (or can make a good case for overall benefit to the community) will be favourable candidates.

Good luck to all those who are thinking of bidding, it could make a real difference.

For more information on the above article, please visit http://www.insidehousing.co.uk/repairs/minister-to-reveal-empty-homes-fund/6520092.article

A new criminal offence: tenancy fraud

The government is proposing to create a new criminal offence of tenancy fraud to crack down on the subletting of social housing.

Under plans unveiled today subletting tenants could face two years in prison or a fine of up to £50,000.

Ministers hope the move will act as a deterrent to sub letting. Any proceeds of fraud recovered will be handed to the landlord, rather than being confiscated by the state, and councils will be given better access to financial and utility company data to help them find tenancy fraud.

Currently subletting is not a criminal offence, so although tenants can be evicted for breaching their tenancy agreement they are unlikely to receive further sanction unless they are prosecuted for another offence, such as fraud.

The government believes between 50,000 and 160,000 social homes could be unlawfully sublet across England.

Housing minister Grant Shapps said: ‘Tenancy cheats are taking advantage of a vital support system for some of the most vulnerable people in our society and getting away with a slap on the wrist while our waiting lists continue to grow’.

‘It’s time for these swindlers to pay the price. It would cost us billions of pounds to replace the huge number of unlawfully occupied social homes across the country.’

Some would argue that Sub-letting is already a criminal offence under the Fraud Act 2006; however if up to 160,000 social homes are sub let, where will these 100,000+ offenders be imprisoned if convicted?

Britain’s jails are overcrowded and ‘very volatile’. Prisons are built, but not as quickly as needed. In a recent letter to Prisons Minister Crispin Blunt, the Prison Officers Association said it was only a matter of time before the Government would have to resort to holding inmates in police cells – a hugely expensive policy known as Operation Safeguard.

Two days before Christmas the total prison population in England and Wales hit an all-time high of 87,960. This is 1,522 short of the maximum capacity and certainly doubling this figure would make the jail terms for sub-letters an impossible task to undertake!

Will there be a crisis, well it certainly will if the government aims to fulfill their promise of tackling the issue with imprisonment!?

Handing out hefty fines and once recovered given to the landlords certainly seems a more plausible punishment, and would certainly offer an extra incentive for landlords to be pro-active in dealing with the problem,.

Extracts taken from Inside Housing and The Daily Mail

Planning ahead for ASB: the multi-agency approach in Scotland

As you know working with partner agencies is the key to making changes.  Scottish organisations agencies are doing precisely this, with results are already emerging from their joined-up approach.

 Hawick is a prime example of what can be achieved by putting an ASB action plan in place. After an alarming number of ASB incidents in the Scottish Boarders town, council, police and housing staff  went door-to-door, to visit residents. The purpose of the visit was to reassure victims of ASB that help was at hand. Each household was given an information guide on how to report and deal with nuisance behaviour.  Anti-social behaviour traditionally rises over the Christmas period and Hawick’s organisations hope that more ASB will be reported and dealt with, as a result of the planning.

Throughout the town, agencies are urging communities to speak up about their problems. By reporting people or addresses, social landlords can address the issue with support from the police and council, where necessary.

Multi agency working is a key part of ReACT’s strategy for the New Year. Having launched a fantastic pilot in Northern Ireland, we are keen to support more partnership work between social landlords, councils and police. (If you are wondering how this is possible, please call Kate Hill or Paul Johns on 0121 384 2513 for more information).

Communication is vital to make partnership working effective and we can see from Hawick that combined action on  ASB really can help. Tenants also get to hear about the efforts being made on their behalf, from extra patrols to the enforcement of by-laws on drinking. (Lothian Police ASB campaign)  

 A final note to say, thank you all for supporting the ReACT blog throughout the year, it has been a great year, full of news and stories. From all the team, we wish you all a very merry Christmas and a happy New Year.

By Kate Hill

Related articles

• Can you fight ASB with a DVD or a tweet? (reactasb.wordpress.com)
• Partnership Working (reactasb.wordpress.com)

Can you fight ASB with a DVD or a tweet?

Image by michperu via Flickr

Three-quarters of people arrested for rioting this summer were under 25 and 90% of them were homeless (Guardian stats). Whilst this was not a surprise, it was a wake-up call for society about the problems of the “Neet generation”.  The Government promptly produced a guide for tackling gang violence and pledged more money for solving the problem. A lot of attention was drawn to the cuts in youth services and charity funding for unemployed youngsters. But very little was said about initiatives that are proven to work.

Here at ReACT, we often keep an eye on what Housing Associations are doing to tackle ASB and improve their tenant’s lives. Here are our top four picks:

1. Acceptable Behaviour Contracts: These are popular and widespread, but statistics are hard to come by. Kirklees Council published the results of their three-year scheme, back in May with an encouraging 75% success rate across 660 interventions.

2. The multi-media approach: The Vale of Glamorgan uses a combination of letters, meeting and DVDs to educate misbehaving youngsters about the error of their ways. The DVD features young people who volunteered to talk about their regret at causing ASB. It is hoped that the video will help change the offender’s behavior, before the council applies for an ASBO. Video testimonials are considered a powerful way to alter behavior by the advertising industry and may have the same effect her

3. The social media approach: Landlords can only tackle ASB when they are told about it. The trick is trying to involve the community, with falling responses to postal surveys and estate walks. In response, housing officers have increased their communications to Twitter and Facebook, as a way to reach the younger, mobile generation. Wherry Housing and Solihull Community Housing have already reported success with this approach, from panel discussions to ASB Consultations. Read the full article in the Guardian.

 4. The activity club: Youth schemes are popular, but their achievements are rarely backed up with hard data. Grantham’s Police Force proved to be the exception to the rule, setting up a summer activity club to explicitly reduce anti-social behavior. They exceeded their target, with the full backing of the community.   

In each case, the council or housing association had a target or measure in mind, when they set up the scheme – making it easier to manage and monitor the results. Have you done the same in your community? Let us know about your success, via the comment box, below!

By Natalie Phillips

Related articles

• Taking action against ASB (reactasb.wordpress.com)
• The new “Respect – ASB Charter for Housing” (reactasb.wordpress.com)

How the Recent Riots Have Affected Housing Professionals

Hackney riots © BBC

On Sunday evening leaseholder homes were among those damaged after rioters set them alight in Tottenham. All residents were evacuated and placed in temporary accommodation.

The following day rioting broke out in Hackney, violence spread to adjoining roads and estates as police and vandals clashed. The areas housing authorities said staff would be available to support people and assist them in the clear up.

There were disturbances that spread to Enfield, Walthamstow and Brixton.

As the week goes on things have worsened and housing staff are being pulled from estates amid fears of a violent rioting.

Some associations were even considering deploying security minders with frontline staff to provide security to housing officers and staff providing support to tenants. Tenants and staff told of the burning of cars, bins and attacks on police.

On some estates though the teenage residents sat guard on their estates discouraging other teenage gangs from entering the estates. Vigilante gangs were becoming prevalent and shop keepers were barricading themselves in their businesses to protect them.

Some organisations by this point were even threatening to evict tenants who were involved in looting in the riots. Councils and RSL’s were working with police to find the perpetrators and using council newsletters and newspapers to publish images of those caught on CCTV.

There was also a petition set up on the government’s e-petition website calling for anyone convicted of rioting to be stripped of all benefits. The petition, which is directed at the Department for Work and Pensions, seems to be attracting significant levels of support.

A London homelessness charity was forced to close early and abandon its late night rough sleeping rescue service, instead dispatching its night rescue team during the day to pinpoint and help rough sleepers. Charities had also been forced to shut several offices early, many of which were located in riot hot spots.

As the violence escalates tenants have been warned by some organisations to stay inside their homes if possible warning residents who live above shops to be especially vigilant. Advice to tenants was: to stay inside their properties and keep family members, particularly children and young adults at home. they were also warned to remove valuable items from the view of their windows and remove petrol cans from their cars.

Fires were being started in shops below homes and residents were warned not rely on a speedy response from the fire brigade as it was unlikely that they would be able to attend within their normal attendance times.

The latest news reports of a former housing office in Salford being attacked as rioting spread across the north and midlands. There is also violence in Manchester city centre, Liverpool and Birmingham, with groups smashing shop windows and looting the goods inside.

This morning communities are preparing to begin the cleanup operations, with appeals for volunteers appearing on social networking site Twitter.

In London, where the violence began on Saturday was relatively quiet. Fears of further rioting had prompted some housing organisations to suspend their services. Social landlords were also working to help tenants stay safe and the advice to tenants was to stay indoors if possible. Some Housing Managers were resorting to ringing round its tenants after the violent riots offering support. Housing managers of certain RSL’s told tenants to call their emergency numbers if they felt threatened by further outbreaks.

Associations have also asked tenants to pass on information on rioting locations that they receive via the Blackberry Messenger service. This service allows users of the handheld device to rapidly transmit messages to networks of friends.

At present there doesn’t seem to be an end in sight, and housing professionals face a challenging couple of weeks in both supporting their residence and taking action against any of their tenants that have perpetrated and contributed to the violence and looting.

By Paul John

Related articles

• riot cleanup – but is it over? (vault9.net)
• MPs due to return to parliament to debate riots (independent.co.uk)