New twist on social housing eviction for ASB

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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)

Social housing and worklessness

The Department for Work and Pension published an informative piece of research this week, looking at the link between social housing and unemployed households. The study seeks to understand the impact the sector has on the working lives of its tenants and the barriers to work experienced by social housing communities. The report itself is 150 pages long, but the 6-page summary is well worth a read. The points that stand out include:

•  
• Being a social tenant actually offers work incentives, such as lower rents and tenure security.
• This is counterbalanced by workless tenants personal or family problems, such as mental health issues, childcare or alcohol abuse and a lack of experience or skills.
• Such problems act as a barrier to secure or better paid work. The work that is available is often casual, low paid and offers no incentive to move off benefits.
• Tenants highlighted difficulties in moving between work and benefits. Bureaucratic delays over the payment of Housing Benefits (for example) created rent arrears.
• Tenants in the private sector experienced more barriers to work, higher rents and unsympathetic landlords to the tenant’s changing financial conditions
• Few respondents would move from their area in search of work. The benefits of a secure social network outweighed the potential job prospects

The report goes some way to taking the emotion out of the debate about the long-term unemployed as well as hinting at possible future solutions. Simplifying the benefit system, cutting beauracracy and offering an  immediate support net when jobs end would help dismantle some of the fears about working. This has to be matched by a comprehensive training program, addressing the individual’s problems and giving them the chance to train for higher-paid work.

Whilst the current lack of jobs does not help, there was a stubborn core of workless households even before the recession. Until this group is given the support and skills to make them more employable, every other state action (e.g. reducing benefits) will not succeed.

None of these conclusions are ground-breaking and many social landlords will have already reached them. We would be interested in hearing your stories, from housing benefit bureaucracy to ways you promote work. Do ASBO’s and other court orders  prevent people from working?

The report is available on the DWP website at http://statistics.dwp.gov.uk/asd/asd5/rports2007-2008/rrep521.pdf

By Natalie Phillips

SLCNG Awards 2011

It was another successful conference this year, with a record number of attendees and a great awards dinner at the St John’s Hotel, Solihull.

Mike and Kate attended the two-day conference and were delighted to see so many delegates contributing to the discussions, sharing both concerns and good practice. There was a general feeling of organisations doing so much for communities and applying the localism bill; however, the tools aren’t always available to complete work.

It was disappointing that Minister Grant Shapps was unable to attend at the last hour; delegates were looking forward to getting some answers for some of their long-standing questions. Baroness Helen Newlove proved to be a worthy replacement, speaking of her tragic loss and work she does to help communities tackle anti-social behaviour. However, there was a general feeling that questions couldn’t be asked of Baroness Newlove – landlords want answers and guidance from government about the direction of tackling ASB.

And the winner is…

Powerful video clips were shown of the shortlisted nominees for the SLCNG Awards 2011, prior to the awards ceremony. With 300 people in attending the dinner, there was both passion and interest in the room for the work on display.

• The Team Award, sponsored by ourselves went to North Tyneside Homes Safer Estates Team
• The Residents Award, sponsored by Glasgow Housing Association went to Daniel Lusardi and Rhys Farthing, Homes for Islington.
• The Best Practice Award, sponsored by HouseMark went to Contour Homes, Victims Champion Project.
• And the Tim Winter Award, sponsored by SLCNG went to Linda Alcock New Progress Housing Association.

Congratulations to all four categories and to the runners-up.  The work that is being done is fantastic.

An entertaining after dinner speaker, Chief Political Correspondent for Radio 5 Live, John Pienaar completed a great first day at SLCNG Conference 2011.

 By Kate Hill

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

Have you signed up to Respect?

Hopefully most readers will know that the Respect – ASB Charter for Housing, which has replaced the Respect Agenda, was launched at the recent CIH Annual Conference in Harrogate.

As of today (17th August) over 100 social housing landlords had signed up to the Charter which is a good start. However I urge you not be complacent. The new Charter is sufficiently different to the old Standard that it merits signing up without delay. The Charter continues to be voluntary, and is a key part of the new, co-regulatory approach within housing. It should be noted that the Charter is not intended to be a wider community safety charter – it is about landlords’ ASB services. However, the importance of partnership working in improving outcomes for service users is acknowledged throughout the Charter.

Go to http://www.cih.org/respectcharter for more information and to sign up.

by Mike Blomer

Related articles

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

Data Sharing Protocol

In my blog on the 7th June, headed “Information Sharing – Fact or Fiction,” I suggested that the problem is with the interpretation of data protection rules and I was not hopeful of any early action to address the issues. Well, I am happy to be proven wrong – whilst I cannot claim any credit whatsoever the newly published “Data Sharing Protocol” (DSP) by the Ministry of Justice appears to tackle the problem head on.

The Ministry of Justice oversees the overarching legislative and non-legislative framework for data sharing across Government and the DSP is guidance which aims to provide all government departments and other public sector bodies (including social housing landlords?) with information and practical help when they start new projects which may involve the sharing of personal data.

It is intended to be a high-level ‘starting point’ for organisations.  It is envisaged that departments will be able to use the guidance, and to change its format to suit their needs and the individual project.

The DSP is aimed at all those in the public sector who enter into data sharing arrangements with other public sector bodies.  It will be particularly helpful to those who have no or limited knowledge of data sharing, although it will be useful for all data sharing projects.

I feel sure that all ASB practioners will join me in expecting our partners, especially the police and maybe even social services, to read, understand and put into practice what is set out in the DSP.

For more information go to http://www.justice.gov.uk/guidance/freedom-and-rights/data-sharing.htm

By Mike Blomer, MBE

Housing sector to take on the RESPECT standard

Grant Shapps has taken localism one step further by announcing the RESPECT's new home with the CIH (Image by conservativeparty via Flickr)

 The Respect Standard, which has played a key role in driving up landlords performance on preventing and tackling anti-social behaviour, will now be run by housing professionals rather than central government, in line with the move to devolve power to communities.

Following an announcement by Housing Minister Grant Shapps on 11th January, the Chartered Institute of Housing (CIH) will take on and manage the new national Standard for preventing and tackling anti-social behaviour with the support of hundreds of signatories from within the social housing sector. Working closely with the Social Landlords Crime and Nuisance Group (SLCNG) and performance improvement organisation HouseMark, CIH will refresh and update the five year old Respect Standard to reflect developments over the last few years.

Sarah Webb, CIH Chief Executive, said: “The Respect Standard has played a key role in supporting landlords and tenants tackle the blight on families and communities that is anti-social behaviour. CIH has played a key role in driving this forward and we are delighted that we will be the new home of standards around anti-social behaviour. CIH is about sector-led improvement and we fully support the government’s plans to pass ownership of excellence in practice back to the front line professionals. After all, these are the people who are responsible for the development and delivery of innovation and improvement that makes a real difference on the ground”.

Eamon Lynch, SLCNG Policy Advisor, said: “This is good news. More than 93% of the landlords we surveyed were keen that the Standard should be retained and updated. From its inception the Standard has been a dynamic tool driving up performance and we look forward to building on that momentum.”

Deputy CEO for HouseMark, Sam McGrady said: “HouseMark has a strong track record in anti-social behaviour performance improvement, and successful working partnerships with both SLCNG and the CIH. We are looking forward to working with them and the sector to develop a new approach to ASB.”

The ReACT team will be keeping a close watch on developments with the intention of ensuring that the all new version 4 of ReACT due to be launched in late summer this year will reflect the inevitable changes to the Standard.

By Mike Blomer with acknowledgements to Eamon Lynch, Policy Advisor, SLCNG

The balancing act of sheltered tenancies

An article from Inside Housing this week illustrated a growing problem in sheltered tenancies. The complex in question (Hampshire court) has long been a desirable place to live for elderly people. But five people have recently left, after anti-social behaviour from new residents. Thanks to a more liberal tenancy approach (and general ageing in society); people with behavioural problems are now being housed in the complex. Drunkenness, urination and noise complaints have become common. And the law-abiding tenants that can move have moved – prompting fears that the sheltered court will soon take on the same stigma as council housing estates.

 

Race to the bottom?

In the past, Hampshire Court vetted prospective tenants before they were allowed onto the scheme. With the abandonment of this policy, a wider range of tenants have been admitted – such as the man who had to be rehomed after conducting a three-year campaign of harassment in another scheme. As social housing becomes the tenure of last resort, more tenants with drug abuse or mental difficulties are likely to be seen. How can these problem tenants be accommodated whilst protecting the peace of the law-abiding majority?

If this problem is ignored, the outcome is likely to be the same as in standard social housing. Those that have the funds will escape to the private sector, whilst those that cannot will try to avoid the worst schemes by any means possible.

Likely outcomes

In some cases, the “sink sheltered scheme” will happen. In others, the housing association or landlord may extend the use of managed tenancies, with explicit codes of conduct, packaged support and clear sanctions for bad behaviour. Such practices have been successful for problem families in standard social accomodation and may work for some sheltered residents.

By Natalie Phillips

Image by graur razvan ionut / FreeDigitalPhotos.net