Blog June 2013

24^th June 2013

We held our Northern English seminar on ‘All You Want to Know about Local Authority Housing Finance’ in Huddersfield on Thursday 20^th June 2013. This seminar is designed as an introduction and overview of local authority housing finance for people who may not be financial experts such as housing managers, local councillors, tenant representatives and people who are new to the finance team.

I enjoy meeting people from different local authorities and other organisations at these events and am grateful to everyone who attended for their support, attention, questions and feedback. As usual the seminar was well received. Some of the feedback follows:

· Very good overview of housing finance, which is what the course was advertised as being.

· Very clear, presentation set at right level. Overall excellent.

· Very clear, informative and more importantly, understandable.

· Very clear and easy to understand, especially to non-financial managers.

· Excellent course, good details and discussion.

· Very helpful and informative.

· Very knowledgeable and clear presentation.

· Excellent information packs and training material.

· Good hand-outs and guide for future reference.

· Really interesting and informative.

The next sessions will be held in Coventry on 2^nd October 2013 and London on 12^th November 2013. Further details can be found at http://www.awics.co.uk/local_authority_housing_finance_2013_training_course.asp

The day before I attended the Impact Housing Association Annual Staff Day in Carlisle in my capacity as Chair. One of the things we did this year was to launch a new initiative that we call the ‘FAST process’ (Five Action Steps to Transition). This is based on the recognition that we have a wealth of untapped talent across the organisation that we want to harness to improve processes and practice. At the staff day all staff members joined one of ten groups that looked at a specific theme for Impact’s future. Each group then made a presentation to the conference with their ideas and all staff voted for the ideas that they thought were best. The winning team were then given a budget of up to £20,000 to implement their ideas.

The winning team was one that looked at ideas for volunteering. We already have a large number of volunteers who make a major contribution to our work in supporting communities; and who also benefit themselves through work experience and training. Our intention is to develop volunteering further with more volunteers adding value to what we do and also benefitting themselves. The other topics that we looked at included skilling tenants, digital inclusion, internal systems, money saving ideas and customer engagement. I am sure that many of the ideas in these areas will also be actioned.

In case you are wondering about the five steps, they are:

· What (you will do)

· How (you propose to do it)

· Time required (couple of hours, a day, weeks, months)

· Resources (budget, people)

· Success (what it will look like)

Last week I published a briefing paper on ‘Local Authority Housing Investment and the Borrowing Cap’. A copy can be freely downloaded from our website at http://www.awics.co.uk/bpborrowing.asp

17^th June 2013

The United Kingdom is recognised as a highly centralised and bureaucratic state and it appears to me that this depresses performance, especially in the public services. Education is very much in the news at the moment, with Michael Gove’s latest proposals being put on the table last week. However, if I was Secretary of State for Education I would take an alternative approach. First, I would abolish the national curriculum – centralised state prescription of the detail of what is taught in schools clearly stifles innovation and demoralises teachers and students - and replace it with local decision making and accountability. Second, I would reduce the amount of testing. There is a saying that a pig gets fatter because you feed it and not because you weigh it. A change in emphasis away from testing and in favour of teaching and learning could only be beneficial.

I went to Carlisle today to attend a meeting of Impact Housing Association’s Senior Management Team in my capacity as Chair. Among other things, we discussed the implications of welfare reform. I was surprised to find that some of our tenants in Salterbeck, Workington – where land values and therefore rents are low – are affected by the ‘benefits cap’. The reason is because they have large families. Salterbeck already has the second highest level of child poverty in Cumbria and the government’s response to the problem is to cut benefits there for large families! How will this help? If any government ministers read this blog I would be grateful if they could write to me at Adrian.waite@awics.co.uk to explain the logic. I would gladly publish their response.

We published the June edition of the ‘AWICS Housing News; today. It contains articles on the following and can be freely downloaded from http://www.awics.co.uk/HousingNews.asp :

· Impact Housing opens Affordable Housing Scheme in the Heart of Kendal

· Housing Associations and Loan Finance

· The Green Deal

· Rents and Development

· Right to Buy Surge

· Emergency Housing Payments

· Housing Supply

· Social housing reforms in Scotland

· Bedroom Tax in the East

Last week I published a briefing paper on Housing Associations and Loan Finance that can be freely downloaded from http://www.awics.co.uk/haloans.asp .

This week brings our northern seminar on ‘All You Want to Know about Local Authority Housing Finance’ on Thursday 20^th June in Huddersfield. It has proved very popular and I am looking forward to meeting the delegates. Details can be found at http://www.awics.co.uk/local_authority_housing_finance_2013_training_course.asp

I have just finished writing the 2013 edition of ‘Developments in Local Authority Housing Finance in England’. Copies will arrive from the printers at the end of the week. Further information and a facility to order copies online will be posted on our website in due course at http://www.awics.co.uk/TechnicalBooks.asp .

10^th June 2013

The financial pressure on local authorities is still increasing and I notice that Herefordshire Council may be the first to ballot its residents on increasing Council Tax by more than 2%. Conventional wisdom is that residents would always vote to minimise Council Tax regardless of the consequences for services and that a ‘no’ vote would quickly be followed with recriminations about the cost of the ballot. It will be a brave local authority that is the first to test the water but if they were successful it would be significant.

I am following the lead up to this month’s Spending Review on 26^th June 2013 with interest. As usual we intend to publish a briefing paper on the implications for local government and housing. If you would like to be notified when it is available please subscribe to our mailing list through our information service at: http://www.awics.co.uk/informationservice.asp

Our latest free briefing paper is now online. It looks at Housing Associations and Loan Finance and can be downloaded from http://www.awics.co.uk/haloans.asp

I have spent some time recently finalising preparations for our Northern session of ‘All You Want to Know about Local Authority Housing Finance’ that will be held in Huddersfield on 20^th June 2013. I have also been preparing for the 2013 session of ‘Developments in Local Authority Housing Finance’ that will be held in London on 9^th July 2013. Both sessions are popular but we have a few places left.

Details can be found on our website:

All You Want to Know about Local Authority Housing Finance:

http://www.awics.co.uk/local_authority_housing_finance_2013_training_course.asp

Developments in Local Authority Housing Finance:

http://www.awics.co.uk/local_authority_housing_finance_seminar_england.asp

3^rd June 2013

Tomorrow is the closing date for the Homes & Communities Agency’s consultation on ‘Protecting Social Housing Assets in a more diverse sector’. The purpose of the Agency’s proposals is to protect public investment in social housing by preventing for-profit providers from using public investment to support non-social housing activities and by controlling the non-social housing activities of not-for-profit providers to prevent losses from these activities being met by surpluses on social housing.

The reasons for the Agency’s concerns are obvious but I am afraid that their proposals for not-for-profit housing associations may have unintended consequences. Many housing associations, including Impact Housing Association of which I am Chair, provide a range of services in addition to letting social housing. These include supported housing, domestic violence services, youth services including Foyers, community services, furniture recycling and student accommodation. The main reason why these services are provided is so that we can do more for our communities by offering a package of services in addition to housing. Housing associations also diversify to provide resources to enable them to continue development – something that government has encouraged.

The Agency proposes to limit these non-core activities to 5% of a housing association’s activity. This will either lead to services being curtailed or to housing associations adopting increasingly complex group structures to enable them to continue. I am not sure that either approach will minimise the risk to public investment or enable associations to offer communities the homes and services that they need.

Impact Housing Association and the Place Shapers’ Group of Housing Associations have both asked for more flexibility and I hope that the Agency will take note.

Shelter Cymru has just published a paper on the ‘Bedroom Tax’ that makes disturbing reading. A couple of quotes from it follow:

“We have clients who are incurring steep debts on credit cards and not heating the house, while waiting for (discretionary housing payment) applications to be processed.

“We had a homeless client who was eight weeks pregnant and looking for accommodation… She came out top of the list when she bid for a two-bedroom property. However, the RSL refused to allocate to her as, until the baby was born, she only had a one-bed need… (The RSL) had their own ‘unpublished policy’ that they were working to.”