Agenda item
SCRUTINY SPOTLIGHT - LEAD MEMBER
The Lead member for Housing and Development, Councillor Marc Francis, will attend to report on his portfolio.
(Time allocated – 30 minutes)
Minutes:
Councillor Marc Francis, Lead Member for Housing and Development, gave a presentation on the key issues, opportunities and challenges arising from his portfolio.
The Committee noted that the Council’s forthcoming Housing Strategy set out five key objectives:
- Decent Homes – focusing on the work needed for the ALMO, Tower Hamlets Homes, to secure a Two Star rating and attract the funding necessary to bring council accommodation up to the Decent Homes Standard.
- Sustainable Communities – a more “people-centred” approach to development in the Borough and what kind of residential schemes people want the new Local Development Framework to deliver.
- Overcrowded Families – how the Council would do more to help the huge numbers of those waiting for a larger or more suitable home.
- New Homes – how the Council would achieve the new Mayor’s extremely challenging new housing supply targets, including over 5,000 new affordable homes between now and 2011.
- Investment – details the level of public funding required to deliver each of the four objectives outlined above, and suggests a way forward for meeting the funding shortfalls identified in specific projects.
Councillor Francis reported that no housing problem in Tower Hamlets was as acute as that of household overcrowding, and this was also a key driver of homelessness in the Borough. With so many households waiting such long periods for the transfer they needed it was inevitable that many children became adults while they were still on the waiting list, and some got married and had children of their own. While there was sometimes a desire, particularly among Bangladeshi families, to live in multi-generational households, this often resulted in tensions between older and younger family members. This in turn, sometimes led to them being told to move out and apply as homeless.
The Committee noted that in total more than 11,000 households were registered on the waiting list for a two, three, four or five-bedroom property. While several hundred of these would be homeless households in temporary accommodation, the overwhelming majority of the remainder were currently living in overcrowded conditions.
In response to questions Councillor Francis detailed a number of innovative schemes designed to try to help overcrowded families. These included:
- Knockthroughs of two properties into one (particularly where one of the properties was already overcrowded)
- Cash incentive schemes to encourage under-occupiers to move into the owner occupied sector where possible
- Cash incentive schemes to encourage under-occupiers to downsize into smaller accommodation
- Young adult members of severely overcrowded households being prioritised for re-housing independently
- Offer cash incentives to encourage council tenants to secure private sector accommodation
The council was also supporting over £200 million of bids by local RSLs for Social Housing Grant funding for new affordable homes in Tower Hamlets. These homes would obviously still take several years to be built so an urgent package of additional measures was being proposed:
- Piloting a Local Homes Initiative that would build social rented homes on small sites for local overcrowded families
- Reform the Choice-Based Lettings scheme, so that it increased the priority awarded to applicants living in overcrowded households
- Purchasing available properties previously sold under the Right to Buy and encouraging housing associations to purchase such homes in their localities
Over the next eighteen months it was expected that this would help an additional 500 overcrowded families over and above those who would have been rehoused otherwise.
Members of the Committee expressed concern regarding the accountability of Registered Social Landlords (RSLs), and the lack of information available to ward members when trying to address residents’ concerns. Councillor Francis accepted that this had been a problem in the past but now a performance management system had been introduced with Tower Hamlets Homes, and a number of RSLs had since been taken to task. There had also been a staffing restructure and training provided for front-line staff, and residents were encouraged to pursue formal complaints.
Councillor Francis also responded to a question concerning community safety and advised that anti-social behaviour was a huge issue, and often ‘right-to-buy’ tenants were responsible. This also needed addressing, possibly by taking action on social landlords.
The Chair thanked Councillor Francis for his very detailed and informative presentation.