Ealing to shut down arm's-length body

Readers' comments (5)

• Peter | 17/09/2009 11:04 am

  This is a terrible blow for the residents though not surprising! Senior officers on both sides were on a massive ego trip and were hell bent on point scoring. Sadly, the residents will sufffer if the £103m funding cannot be accessed and I sincerely hope this does not happen.
  
  Shame on you Ealing Homes and Ealing Council!!!!

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• 

  | 19/09/2009 2:26 pm

  All goes to show that ALMOs are arms length in name only. It's the local authority parent that always wears the trousers in the relationship. From the Brixen ruling to the right of audience before court issue, time and again, it has been demonstrated that ALMOs are merely the housing department of the local authority with a new badge. In most cases, it is the same officers staffing a given ALMO as were employed by the parent LA prior to transfer. Sometimes this is good, sometimes bad. But at least there remains choice in the matter of who manages. Because the LA is in charge. And the electorate get to choose the political make-up of the LA every four years. Say if Ealing had transferred to a HA and the HA screwed up. What recourse would LB Ealing have had? None. Because a HA is accountable to, well, nobody really. The complaints made about Ealing's ALMO, namely "poor governance, weaknesses in handling complaints and inadequate management of the repairs and maintenance budget" could easily be levelled at nearly every stock transfer HA. And what can the LA or the stock transferred tenants and leaseholders actually do about that? Nothing.
  
  All goes to show the ALMO route was the best stock transfer route. As it can always be reversed. Unlike the HA route which means that everyone concerned, from LA to tenant, is always stuck with the HA, no matter how much the HA screws up.
  
  Moving forward, if Ealing open up the management contract to the private sector, this could well be the first "proper" tender of a LA housing management contract. If the tender goes to a competent managing agent who is a member of ARMA and adheres to their code of practise, then it could well work very well and could hopefully be the first of many such privatisations. Which are long overdue. The total lack of competition and real private sector discipline (HA's are not private sector as they remain dependent on the State for funding) in the public sector is what leads to the culture of "poor governance, weaknesses in handling complaints and inadequate management of the repairs and maintenance budget". It's time the usual suspects - public sector housing officers and employment practise - were subject to some much needed competition and scrutiny. Well done LB Ealing!

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• susan wallerby | 21/09/2009 10:13 am

  I've suspected (and I would imagine i'm not the only one) that this was the whole point of ALMO's from the start, and that is privatisation of housing services. "Oh No!" they screamed.."this is not in anyway privatisation" but a few years later they show that the former public owned services and officers are not up to the job and bring in private competition. "ARMS LENGTH" translates to "Its nothing to do with us, and not our fault" Investors who want to profit from public finance, will offer to save us from ourselves, and ruin us at the same time.
  
  Wake up UK, your being sold out.

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• Windowmaker | 22/09/2009 5:24 pm

  Ealing Homes just does not deserve this.
  
  Whilst it's true there have been some pretty weird personalities at the helm there in the past the ALMO itself is strong and has done some pretty good work. Only last year it was rated as the best for overall improvement in tenant satisfaction levels and it has more Charter marks, upper quartile performance figures and IIP than you could shake a stick at.
  
  The fact is that the Council and in particular the senior officers in the retained Housing Department just don't like ALMOs and have said so publicly on a number of occasions.
  
  Don't be taken in by the argument that Ealing Homes is a poor performer, it's not and it never has been the decision to do away with it is purely personal and political.
  
  The decision to break it up and sell it off is wrong and ordinary people in Ealing staff, tenants and leasholders are bound to suffer as a consequence of the arrogance, bad faith and bad judgement of a few powerful individuals.

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• lg | 29/03/2010 6:46 pm

  >>Don't be taken in by the argument that Ealing Homes is a poor performer,
  >> it's not and it never has been the decision to do away with
  >> it is purely personal and political.
  
  So the Audit Commission downgrade from two stars to one star is good performance?? what planet are you on, that's F for Failure in my eye's.
  
  I'm a resident in Acton and have been the victim of appalling anti social behaviour for 4 years by a Ealing homes tenant. Ealing homes did nothing except 'log the complaint' and tell me 'we've got to put them somewhere', can't believe its taken so long to sack them, lets hope the new guard can at least move the 'F' to a 'D'

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