Agenda item

Report of the Head of Health and Housing (attached)

The draft tenancy strategy is attached as Appendix 1 to this report,

Purpose: the committee is asked to consider the draft tenancy strategy, attached as an appendix to the report, and provide Cabinet with its views prior to Cabinet considering a final draft of the strategy for adoption.

The committee considered the report of the Head of Health and Housing setting out the draft tenancy strategy. The council was consulting on the strategy until 1 March 2013 and the final policy would be submitted to Cabinet for approval.

Mr P Staines, Head of Health and Housing, and Ms A Badcock, Cabinet member, introduced the report and answered questions from the committee as follows:

·        The strategy set out how the council would like to work with registered providers.

·        The Department of Homes and Communities could be asked to intervene if there were serious concerns about the actions of a registered provider.

·        The council had no control over the registered providers selected by developers to provide and manage affordable housing within a development.

·        Grant funding for new houses was greatly reduced but the requirement to offer finance to bring forward affordable housing remained. The government’s vision was that instead Registered Providers would have to borrow commercially against their asset base.

·        The government were promoting right to buy and requiring councils and housing associations to give enhanced discounts.

·        Tenancy reviews should be frequent enough to make best use of the stock but infrequent enough to allow tenants to settle. The cabinet member and officers considered that five years was a reasonable review period.

·        Housing associations needed to work with people likely to be affected before the changes took effect and councillors could help to alert them to any tenants who needed help. Housing Services had a contract with the Citizens’ Advice Bureau and could refer tenants to it for specialist money advice.

·        The strategy asked Registered Providers to reflect upon the tensions between, and merits of, lower and higher percentages of market rent when setting rent levels taking into account issues of affordability for local people.

Councillors were concerned about the impact of the bedroom standards on disabled people who required an extra bedroom for overnight carers; those whose homes had been adapted; and those who would have to move away from established community support. Officers advised that Registered Providers needed time to find suitable solutions for disabled people affected by the bedroom standard. Tenants could apply for discretionary housing payments to cover short-term rent shortfalls. It was possible that social services may cover the extra rent required for overnight carers’ rooms.

One councillor commented that social rents should be at a level that allowed tenants to be aware of the true level of market rents and to more easily bridge the gap between social and private rents as they moved into work.

There were mixed views on the merits of five or two year tenancy reviews. Lengths of residence did not necessarily correlate with community involvement. However, communities should not have an unnecessarily high level of turnover as a result of frequent tenancy reviews.

Councillors asked for:

·        training, and advice to pass to residents, about the implications of the bedroom standard and the changes to rents and tenancies;

·        the stock profile of SOHA housing and in particular the number of one-bedroom properties;

·        that the results of the consultation be circulated to all councillors and discussed with the Chairman of Scrutiny.

The committee agreed that it wished to consider the final draft of the strategy after the consultation finished if significant changes were made and if the timetable for decision permitted.