Closed Circuit: lights out

Dire pronouncements from Sir Ed Lister in his opening keynote seemed to come true almost as soon as the words left his mouth, thanks to technical difficulties.

The Homes and Communities Agency chair bemoaned “the challenge we face as an industry”, which turned out to be somewhat euphemistic.

No sooner had he announced that “there’s no piece of this industry that’s working as it should” than the conference room promptly proved him right, with the lights malfunctioning and plunging the room into (relative) darkness.

Closed Circuit wonders if Sir Ed will order state intervention in the lightbulb market to overcome this sort of endemic failure.

What’s “one of the worst things you can do”, according to Ann Santry, chief executive of Sovereign? Steal from a child, perhaps? Murder, maybe?

The answer “put on a dress and then try and put on a microphone” was Ms Santry’s suggestion.

Don’t worry Ann, we won’t judge you.

“I won’t tell you where my microphone is,” said the Sovereign boss in a slightly bizarre way of beginning a speech about mergers, which was followed by titters from the less mature members of the Housing 2017 audience.

Delegates at Housing 2017 who want to make the most of the conference sessions have an awful lot of information to take in over the course of the week.

From breakfast briefings to close of play, there’s not a second without an interesting nugget to pick up on.

Sadly, it all proved too much for one delegate during a presentation by Carl Brazier, director of housing and customer services at Stoke-on-Trent City Council. The guest could be heard snoring loudly at the back of the room.

Mr Brazier said he wouldn’t take it personally as the gentleman was shaken awake. Closed Circuit can confirm Mr Brazier gave an excellent presentation – and the sleeping beauty can read all about the content at insidehousing.co.uk.