Social Housing Fails
We get fed-up of social housing providers being treated as saints and private sector landlords as demons when all of the evidence is to the contrary...
Who failed this time?
The BBC reported 'serious failings' in Bristol City Councils 22,000 homes – unable to show carbon monoxide requirements were being met in any of them, 3,000 overdue fire safety actions, 1,900 properties with unresolved damp and mould issues and over 16,000 overdue repairs. The regulator stated 'significant improvement' was needed. Full story here.
The same regulator reported 'serious failings' in Surrey council's role as a landlord – again calling for significant improvement highlighting issues with electrical reports and certificates. See that story here.
Earlier this year, Portsmouth introduced a new policy for mould and damp in council owned homes following the tragic death of Awaab Ishak, a toddler who died from mould exposure. At the time, Cllr. Corkery described it as 'encouraging' and called it a "big change in approach over the last couple of years across the sector. Too many times serious issues were just dismissed as lifestyle problems, not particularly by PCC but across the sector," – remember, PCC is not saint in this space, as far as we know Windsor House (a private residence with major problems including damp, which PCC has been unsuccessfully using its regulatory powers to ensure the absentee freeholder resolves some of the issues). Sadly, it still suffers problems 2.5 years on from this BBC report and PCC have spent more than £111,000 fixing such problems on its own properties. Details here.
And to complete the set – readers will have seen reports of services families living in MoD accommodation, both in the city and elsewhere where standards expected in the private sector have not been met.
And do not ask how many council properties will be EPC band 'C' by 2030 as there are blocks of 60's built accommodation around the city that will really struggle to achieve these energy performance standards.
Why do we care? Well – apart from the demonisation of private sector landlords for being 'greedy and uncaring' the presumed sainthood of Housing Associations and Local Authority housing providers means that when they do make a mistake, as in these examples, the regulator publishes a mild slap on the wrist in the form of a written judgement that promises 'to work together with… to improve'. Contrast that with a private sector landlord who faces a criminal record and a £30,000 fine for any misdemeanour the local authority considers serious enough – we know of one local landlord operating a perfectly safe property that meets all of the necessary standards who has been threatened with a £10,000 fine for not applying for something he was never told he needed to apply for – how does that justify a fine of that magnitude compared to some of the 'no fine considered necessary' misdemeanours of social housing providers mentioned above?