Time to rebuild housing strategy in wake of axing house building targets, say Greens

 Ellie Chowns, Green Party spokesperson on Housing and Communities

 

The Green Party has welcomed a decision by ministers to axe arbitrary house building targets LINK and have called for future housing development to be led by affordability, quality and environmental standards. 

Green Party spokesperson on Housing and Communities, Ellie Chowns, who is also a Cabinet Member on Herefordshire Council, said:

Councils of all political colours have pushed back against unrealistic top-down housing targets, which have taken decision-making away from local authorities and ignored the views of local people. And where targets have been missed, it has allowed developers to get away with lower quality housing that is less sustainable and less affordable.

It’s time to rebuild a housing strategy that takes powers away from central government and the giant house builders funnelling money into Tory Party coffers and give councils the power to set their own housing targets to meet the needs of local populations. We need the focus of future development to be on building genuinely affordable housing that is good for local people while helping to tackle the cost of living crisis and the climate emergency. 

We certainly do need thousands more new homes but the priority should be on homes for social rent, built to the highest environmental standards so they dramatically cut energy bills and carbon emissions. We also need to prioritise building on brownfield sites and preserve our precious green spaces which are good for public health and for nature. 

All new housing must also be served by high quality walking and cycling routes and much improved public transport services.

Task Group: Brent needs to rethink its partnerships with housing associations

Top 10 providers by housing association

Last night's Community and Wellbeing Scrutiny Commitee considered the Task Group on Brent Housing Association's Report LINK. The task group was led by Cllr Tom Miller.

Executive Summary and key recommendations:
 

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The task group looked at the effects of the Housing and Planning Act 2016 and the Welfare Reform and Work Act 2016 in five key areas: Right to Buy, social housing supply, 1% social rent cut, a voluntary Pay to Stay, and partnerships with the council.

This task group supports increasing home ownership and is not opposed to the principle of giving tenants the opportunity to buy their own home; however, that can only work if homes sold under the Right to Buy are replaced at least one-for-one in Brent and that social and genuinely affordable housing still continues to be provided across all tenures in the borough.

Although the task group does not believe Right to Buy will be taken up in significant numbers, it could exacerbate the borough’s existing housing crisis by further reducing social housing stock. Even if social housing is replaced, there is uncertainty about the type of product that would replace it and there could be a time lag between loss and replacement. This will be made worse if already scarce housing stock is sold. Therefore, the local authority should insist on explicit exemptions of four-bedroom family-sized homes, supported housing and specially adapted housing which if it is sold under the extended Right to Buy will be extremely difficult to replace.

Brent Council also needs to consider other supply-side measures it can take such as joint development with registered providers which maximises the amount of social housing retained in the borough, and stimulating growth in other models of social housing in Brent such as housing co-operatives, community housing, self and custom build and community land trusts.

The demands of the legislation means Brent Council will also need to rethink its existing partnerships with housing associations, and the relationships between them. More of the knowledge and expertise which the local authority has could be shared as a way of building more effective partnerships. Similarly, the expertise which large housing associations have accumulated could be shared with the smaller registered providers in the borough.

The task group believes it may no longer be realistic for one local authority to be able to negotiate on equal terms with such large organisations. Therefore, the task group calls for far greater cross-London working as a counter-balance, and for a recognition of the important niche services that smaller housing associations offer to tenants and residents in Brent.

Finally, the importance of tenants’ voices and listening to their concerns needs to be remembered and this important perspective should be better integrated into partnership working.

Theme 1: Right to Buy 

1. Strategic Director Community Wellbeing convenes a working party dedicated to Right to Buy with registered providers which meets to monitor the impact of the policy in Brent and helps to mitigate any potential problems which are caused.
2. Cabinet Member for Housing sets out a common position to all registered providers operating in Brent that the local authority would like homes of four bedrooms or more, specially adapted housing, and older people’s housing exempted from the Right to Buy.
3. Strategic Director Community Wellbeing and Cabinet Member for Housing develop agreements with housing associations and the Greater London Authority which maximise the number homes replaced in Brent, including four-bedroom properties, as well as homes for social rent.
4. Strategic Director Community Wellbeing invites housing associations operating in Brent to fund jointly an anti-fraud investigator for a time-limited period to help housing associations’ investigations into Right to Buy fraud and offer free training for staff on fraud and speculative buying practices.
5. Director of Policy, Performance and Partnership to consider integrating Right to Buy into Brent’s financial inclusion strategy so that tenants are better informed about interest rates, mortgages, cost of major works, responsibility for repairs, and the operation of companies who encourage purchasing of homes under Right to Buy.
6. Cabinet Member for Housing requests that housing associations advise tenants of their financial options, and inform them of the wider responsibilities of becoming a leaseholder as part of the purchasing process for Right to Buy.
7. Cabinet Member for Housing ensures a working party of registered providers convened around the Right to Buy extension shares information and expertise about properties going into the private rented sector. 

Theme 2: Social housing supply
8. The Strategic Director Community Wellbeing and Lead Member for Housing to initiate further discussions with other London local authorities about collaborative arrangements for the provision of social housing in the future.
9. Brent’s Cabinet Member for Housing to consider setting up a forum for smaller housing associations to be able to gain expertise and knowledge in business planning and other areas from the larger registered providers operating in Brent.

10. Cabinet Member for Housing and Strategic Director Community Wellbeing put in place mechanisms to signpost residents to information about the Community Land Trust Network and Federation Confederation of Cooperative Housing and self and custom-build networks and organises a one-off event to stimulate interest in developing other social housing models.
11. The Strategic Director for Community Wellbeing commissions a feasibility study about developing affordable self-build on marginal areas of council owned-land which is not suitable for its own house building programme.
12. Brent Council to update its Housing Strategy 2014-19 to weight available council- owned land not intended for the council’s own house-building programme towards housing association or partnership developments which house social tenants and vulnerable people in line with the council’s political commitments. 

Theme 3: Social rent reduction
13. Brent Council to continue to work closely with social landlords in the borough to evaluate the effects of welfare reform, in particular the overall benefit cap, and to develop appropriate processes and procedures that facilitate the achievement of this. 

Theme 4: Pay to Stay
14. Cabinet Member for Housing to request that housing associations operating in Brent report regularly to the council outlining any progress they are considering in implementing Pay to Stay. 

Theme 5: Partnerships
15. Cabinet Member for Housing organises more frequent forums around specific issues such as rents, welfare reform and employment as well as linking with London- wide housing groups so there can be a useful exchange of information and expertise.
16. The Strategic Director of Community Wellbeing organises a housing summit each year to bring together all the registered providers in the borough in addition to the regular quarterly forum meetings.
17. In collaboration with housing associations, Brent Council develops mechanisms that will enable housing association tenants to share their concerns and service priorities.
18. Cabinet Member for Housing to write to housing associations to encourage tenants’ representation at the board level of housing associations by bottom-up elections.

19. Cabinet Member for Housing to develop a partnership model which is more weighted towards those providing in-demand tenures and housing.

Attempt to clear up confusion on council rent increases not entirely successful

Pete Firmin

Speaking to Brent Executive last night, Pete Firmin, secretary of Brent TUC, a South Kilburn resident and Labour Party member, lambasted the Council's stance on council rent increases.  He said that the annual above inflation increases, which in his case would mean an increase of 40% over 5 years, should be unacceptable to a Labour Council.

The plans were included in the Housing Strategy officers' report which Firmin described as impenetrable. Several people had tried to make sense of it, including Brent Central potential Labour candidate Kingsley Abrams, and had been unable to say with absolute certainty what was proposed. His local Kilburn councillors had said they knew nothing about it and when he asked Cllr Margaret McLennan and Cllr Michael Pavey, both members of the Executive what it meant, they confirmed rent rises over five years to 80% of market rents.

He said that the Council would be adding to the financial problems of people already hit by benefit cuts, council tax benefit changes and higher food and energy prices. He asked why tenants were being forced to fund new build through the rent increases and contrasted that with the freezing of the Council Tax.

Firmin said that this was not something the Council had to do and he circulated information from Islington Council  on its approach.

Muhammed Butt defended the Council's approach saying that new housing was imperative. Cllr  Margaret McLennan, lead member for housing, said that the policy referred to social rent and not market rents (a search of the report reveals that the only mention of social rent is one about the possible national fixing of these).  She said that the Council had not yet decided on their definition of an affordable social rent.  She said that that the planned new build was good news ands that the plans had receved a high level of endorsement.The priority was to house people on the waiting list.

Andy Donald, head of Regeneration and Major Project, said the new build would go straight to an 'affordable' rent of between 60% and 80% of market rent. This was the government's definition and the Council would have to charge that to use a government grant. If new build was at an 'affordable rent' it would help fund the refurbishment of existing stock. The actual rent rises would be fixed in February 2013 and would be roughly 4% higher in 2014-15.

Cllr Pavey waded in to say that Pete Firmin should have discussed this earlier, the Islington document was interesting but why hadn't Pete circulated it beforehand (and anyway they had more land available than Brent) and then ended with what is fast becoming his mantra: this is not perfect but the best we can do in difficult times.

Many of us left not entirely clear on what was proposed and I suspect that was also true of the Executive members who voted to approve the strategy.

Confusion over Council's policy on rent rises

I live on a Brent Housing Partnership estate which has a mixture of flats, maisonettes, terraced houses and town houses. These are occupied by a mixture of 'right to buy' freehold owners (or purchasers from an original right to buy owner), leaseholders, BHP tenants, private tenants and probably some sub-lets.

Two bedroomed flats and houses are privately let for between £800 and £1,200 a month, social housing tenants pay much less.

Some of the privately owned homes have been fitted with double glazing while the BHP properties have not. Energy bills for the latter are therefore much higher.

There is considerable and much appreciated green space on the estate.

I give this as background to the Housing Assess Management Strategy Report that is going to the Brent Executive tomorrow.  The report contains a mixture of measures which involves  disposing of some properties and selling the freehold on some blocks.  It involves plans to build a small number of new units of existing estates, initially between 70 and 100, to cater for larger families and a long-term 7 year plan for 1,000 new 'affordable' homes.  Importantly there are plans for refurbishment of existing stock. Clearly new homes and refurbishment will be very welcome.

The plans will be financed by the sell-offs, some borrowing and controversially rent increases.The latter has caused concern amongst Labour Party members as well as tenants because the documents going to the Executive seem to indicate that existing tenants' rents will increase over the next 5 years to 'converge' at 80% of market rents, which by some definitions is an 'affordable rent' - a figure the Council has challenged in the past..  At the same time the new properties will be immediately let at an affordable rent with some caveats (see extract below).

The concern is that the convergence strategy will result in a likely doubling of rent for existing tenants over the next 5 years at a time when incomes are static but the cost of living is rising and benefits have been cut.

What I and others have been trying to work out from the documentation going before the Executive is whether that is what is really envisaged and hopefully, as a result of protests due to representations that will be made, it will become clearer. The figures quoted do not seem to equate to a doubling of rent.

Meanwhile here is an extract from the Appendices that readers

The extract below from the Appendices sets out the rent strategy and I leave readers to try and interpret wht it means concretely:

Rent Policy

Strategic Approach

For rents to continue to increase in line with the  rent convergence regime- a maximum annual increase in 2014 of RPI +0.5% plus £2 per week and from 2015 CPI+ 1% plus £2 per week for existing tenants - subject to any direction by Government

Following rent convergence for the annual increase  to be set at CPI+1%

For properties to be re-let at target rents

For consideration to be given annually to restraint in rent increases for 4-bedroom and larger properties in order to assure affordability under the overall benefits cap

For new-build and newly-acquired properties (except where required for decant) to be let at affordable rents in line with the thresholds set out within the Council’s Tenancy Strategy.

Context

Rents are the primary income to the HRA business plan and provide the funding to support stock investment and for new development.

In recent years the Council has increased rents in  line with the government’s rent convergence regime. The government has recently issued guidance

that rent convergence should end from 2015/16 at which point the majority of the HRA stock will not have achieved convergence. Currently the Council retains the discretion to not follow the recent guidance. Further clarification of the

position by Government is expected by early 2014 and account will need to be taken of this.

The government has also issued recent guidance that from 2015 rent increases will be linked to a different inflation index – and be based on CPI plus 1% rather than RPI plus 0.5% as previously.

Approach

In order to provide a secure basis for the funding of the Asset Management Strategy, a rent policy for the next five-year period will operate. The policy will be for rents for existing tenants to continue to rise in line with the principles of the government’s previous Rent Convergence regime unless government directs otherwise. For 4-bed and larger units rent increases may be constrained in order to assure affordability under the Overall Benefits Cap.

In order to support viability, new homes will be let at Affordable Rents. These will be limited to varying percentages of the market-rent depending on the size of the unit in order to assure affordability for those affected by the Overall Benefits Cap.

Source: http://democracy.brent.gov.uk/documents/s20059/rg-hra-app1.pdf