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We need to break out of the housing sector and sell our message to the public
To make the Shelter commission report’s recommendations a reality we need to speak to people’s emotions, writes Sinéad Butters
“If we can’t do this now, we can’t do it,” said Polly Neate, chief executive of Shelter, at the launch of the charity’s social housing commission report last week.
And indeed, the buzz reinforced that the much-quoted ‘once-in-a-lifetime opportunity’ seemed right. We’ve had politicians saying that what’s been done in the past didn’t work, commissioners who have cared deeply and listened to the voices of thousands of tenants, and a report with wide-ranging, ambitious and robust recommendations.
The report puts social housing at the heart of solving homelessness and improving communities for us all – it speaks to every element of what I believe in.
“We need to bring a lot of people in our very divided country with us”
It clearly does to many others, including politicians of the main parties. Economically it makes sound sense, saving the country £60bn on benefit costs.
So why do I also feel reticence?
It comes from the killer question asked at the end of the launch: how do we make this a reality? Because for all the optimism in that room, it’s a huge ask.
We need to bring a lot of people in our very divided country with us.
It does us all good to take our heads out of ‘housing sector’ chatter and reaction – some of the Twitter reaction to 3.1 million more social homes wasn’t pretty. But I understand that. The figures that to us show the scale of the crisis are just scary to many people.
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After all, 3.1 million homes is more or less the size of London.
People start to think about what that means for them – visions of saturating already overcrowded areas and reduced access to already stretched public services.
Those fed a diet of stigma-reinforcing news will create their own stories of who will live in these homes.
The report, though, is excellent on making the case for investment in social housing and why existing communities will be stronger for it.
Investment creates a virtuous circle – income funds more homes and increased supply relieves pressure, which drives up standards in the private rented sector and fuels mobility by allowing people to save for homeownership.
But we need to take this debate beyond investment and speak to people’s emotions.
People care about their local areas, their communities and the life they can build. We need to show the importance of strong communities, with homes that everyone can afford.
The 3.1 million homes are for people who ‘just’ want the security of a secure, decent home from where they can live their life, something we should all be able to aspire to.
“We need to take this debate beyond investment and speak to people’s emotions”
They are for older people in private rented accommodation scared that their landlord will refuse to do repairs or evict them.
For people who will never be able to buy a home. Or to let people save towards homeownership. And for those who are vulnerable, who through circumstances beyond their control haven’t had all the advantages that others enjoy. Who wouldn’t want them to have a home?
As a sector, we have got to sell this – yes, sell it. Help people whose news feeds are filled with other matters understand why this matters and why it needs to work.
“As champions of community-led housing, we need to stand shoulder to shoulder with our tenants to sell the report in our communities”
In our divided country, people are wary of politicians and ‘experts’ and believe what they see around them.
So as champions of community-led housing, we need to stand shoulder to shoulder with our tenants to sell the report in our communities.
At our PlaceShapers autumn conference we all agreed on the importance to selling our story – and it’s a good one.
In 20 years’ time, the report shows the dream of a country where everyone has a secure, decent home in a strong community. It is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, and we have got a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to make it a reality.
Sinéad Butters, chair, PlaceShapers and chief executive, Aspire
At a glance: the Shelter commission’s recommendations
Complaints and regulation
- The government should create a new consumer regulator to protect renters and ensure their voices are heard. This should operate alongside the Regulator of Social Housing, focused on its core economic brief.
- Social housing residents need better protection. Government should require standards of social housing to be proactively inspected, publicly reported, and strongly enforced in order to hold failing landlords to account.
- If residents are to be protected and given a voice, there must be clearer standards for social housing providers. The government should direct the regulator to make consumer standards more specific; setting clear, minimum expectations, like timescales for dealing with complaints.
- All groups of residents (whether recognised by their landlords or not) should be able to refer their concerns directly to the new regulator where they have common concerns they believe are caused by a systemic failing in the landlord’s services.
- Residents should not have to prove they might be at risk of serious detriment for the regulator to intervene. The government should remove the ‘serious detriment’ test for intervention in complaints about social housing, which is a barrier to proper enforcement of consumer standards.
- To make it easier for social renters to get redress on individual complaints, barriers to complaining must be removed. The government should remove the democratic filter for referral to the Housing Ombudsman
- Residents must be given support to complain. The government should extend the Legal Help scheme to cover detailed advice and support to make a referral to the ombudsman or the regulator.
Tenant voice and involvement
- Tenant panels should be encouraged and taken seriously. The government and Regulator should urgently require landlords to actively support the formation of tenant panels and share good practice on how this should be done.
- Residents of social housing must have a voice with national, regional, and local government. Government should support establishment of an independent tenants’ voice organisationor tenants’ union, to represent the views of tenants in social housing within national and local government. It should involveas wide a range of tenants as possible.
- Residents must have a leading voice in major works to existing homes or neighbourhoods. The government’s good practice guidance on estate regeneration should be revisedto reflect this.
- The government should compile good practice on cooperative and mutual social housing models. Transfers of existing homes to such models should only happen if triggered by tenants, and if voted for by a majority of tenants.
Reforming private renting
- Government should require all private landlords with over25 homes to register with the new consumer regulator.
- The new consumer regulator should set consumer standards for all private rented housing.
- The government should increase resources for local enforcement to tackle rogue landlords and poor conditions, in line with the growth in the number of private rented properties.
- The government should protect private renters from no-fault eviction. It should end Section 21 by changing the law so permanent tenancies are the legal minimum for all private renters. It should make sure they are protected from eviction by above-market rent increases. The government should explore how to introduce more detailed information about rent levels for different property types at a ward level.
Building more social homes
- Government should deliver enough social homes over the next 20 years for the 3.1 million households who will be failed by the market, providing both security for those in need, but also a step up for young families trying to get on and save for their future.
- Government should reform the Land Compensation Act 1961 so that landowners are paid a fair market price for their land, rather than the price it might achieve with planning permission that it does not actually have. It could do this most simply by; amending Section 14 so that no account is taken of any prospective planning permission in land designated by local authorities or city regions for infrastructure including housing; amending Section 17 so that Certificates of appropriate alternative development cease to apply in those areas designated by local authorities or city regions for development.
- In future assessments of housing need, government should specify the need for social housing.
- Government should remove the exemptions that mean Section 106 rules do not always apply to new developments and conversions.
- Government should ensure that any Right to Buy scheme(s) are sustainable, by replacing any social housing sold.
- Government should embrace modern methods of construction in a way that reduces risk and builds public confidence, using methods that are proven to work over the long term.
- Government should set a standard to ensure investment in maintaining and improving homes and neighbourhoods over their full lifetime.
- Anyone involved in delivering social housing should ensure that new social homes are delivered as part of tenure-blind, mixed-community developments. This includes avoiding design that will contribute to a sense of exclusion, e.g.avoiding separate entrances to the same building that divide households based on tenure.
