Get ready to mouth off

Are you heading to Harrogate for the Chartered Institute of Housing’s annual housing conference and exhibition later this month? If the answer is yes, then you will get the chance to make sure your voice is heard in the housing ‘pact’ to be presented to housing minister Grant Shapps at the end of the event.

Throughout the week, the BBC’s Lesley Riddoch will host a series of ‘have your say’ sessions - an opportunity for all those interested in housing to air their views on a range of subjects, from skills to localism to the level of housing benefit we can afford in this age of austerity. We asked some of housing’s big beasts for their views. Disagree with them? Then set the housing world to rights by hotfooting it to Harrogate yourself.

John Healey

Shadow housing minister

On the future of affordable housing

‘The prospects for the future of affordable housing are extremely poor. The government has downgraded the housing minister from being at cabinet and made no promises on affordable homes. The first £6 billion of spending cuts - including £230 million from the Homes and Communities Agency budget - [are] aimed at the poorest areas first, with more to come.

‘[If Labour was still in government], instead of cutting the money to build new affordable homes, we would be completing year two of our housing pledge: more council homes, more housing association homes and Kickstart cash to keep the house building industry going.’

Most likely to agree: grant-hungry development directors

Most likely to disagree: The Dave and Nick Coalition Show

Nick Bennett

Chief executive, Community Housing Cymru

On skills in housing

‘[The skills which housing professionals need at the moment are] adaptability, bravery, courage and emotional intelligence. There are issues around adaptability - like courage - that are obviously innate in people, but there’s a much greater need now to develop people’s broader leadership ability and skills and have the courage to serve communities at a time of public services being scrapped. So there are much bigger questions about… what the not-for-profit sector can do in terms of providing more with less.’

Most likely to agree: anyone who sees themselves as housing’s answer to John McClane

Most likely to disagree: one-trick ponies

David Orr

Chief executive, National Housing Federation

On the new local agenda

‘The thing about housing, unlike almost any other commodity, is that you can’t pick it up and move it around. So by its definition, a housing service is always a local thing. Good housing provision understands the locality.

’So although the vocabulary may change, these are all the things we have been talking about for several years now. If the government is looking to discuss local issues with local people, then housing providers are crucial to that. The people who know best what’s needed in their given locality are the people who live there. And the challenge that we have is ensuring those voices are heard in scoping out what kind of provision is necessary.

‘The localism agenda is our agenda. It is what we’ve been doing for years now and I think the kind of vocabulary coming from government gives us an opportunity to do it better.’

Most likely to agreed: housing associations

Most likely to disagree: any politician who has ever laid claim to inventing localism

Natasha Williams

Chartered Institute of Housing student of the year 2010

On skills in housing

‘On my housing degree [BA Hons in professional housing studies from Birmingham City University], they didn’t give us enough practical skills to be able to go into work and hit the ground running, doing rents and arrears and so on.

‘What we did get were skills that related to housing at a strategic level: analytical skills, report writing and presentation. The housing courses need to address skills at a more practical level. Although you get the knowledge about the tenancy agreements, you don’t actually go into a court and see how it works when you sort out tenant arrears, for example.

‘I shadowed some housing officers myself and that filled the gap. I think the skills we need to develop really are people skills. We’ve got to be quite diplomatic, be able to take on additional tasks and have energy and enthusiasm. You need to be able to work on your own initiative and in a team.
‘A lot of housing graduates haven’t got the chance to go in at the [job] level that they want to go in at [because they don’t have the necessary practical skills]. Housing skills also need to address skills relating to health and social care.’

Most likely to agree: the housing graduates forced to sign on

Most likely to disagree: housing theory-lovers

Richard Parker

Head of housing, PricewaterhouseCoopers

On the future of affordable housing

‘There are real issues around funding going forward and it’s inevitable that budgets will be cut… The fact that the housing market and the economy are going to be slow to recover [from the recent recession] gives a real challenge. We face a shortage of government funding and we’re not going to be generating [cross-subsidy to build homes from] section 106 deals.

‘There’s a real challenge in how we use government resources. There’s then a debate to be had about whether or not we use these resources to fund different types of affordable homes and how politicians allocate that funding.

‘General needs housing is costly in terms of grant support… I think we’ve got to be really careful about how we spend the money [that is available]… We still need to look at mixed schemes and we must avoid just using it to support social rented houses. The bigger need is from… those who will never get on the waiting lists for social housing or [be able to afford] home ownership.’

Most likely to agree: private renters who can only dream of buying

Most likely to disagree: tenure-for-life fan

Have your say’ sessions will be running throughout the Housing 2010 Conference and Exhibition taking place from 22-24 June in Harrogate. For full details, see www.cihhousing.com

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