Quick fix

Former housing minister Kris Hopkins was wrong when he said that landlords wouldn’t find it difficult to let some homes as a result of welfare reform.

He may have had a point, however, when he said they would have to be creative.

Research into the accounts of 100 of the UK’s largest associations published by Inside Housing this week reveals just how creative some housing associations have had to be.

Particularly in the north of England, a number of associations did indeed find it more difficult to let larger properties following the introduction of the bedroom tax in April 2013. Their financial statements reveal that they have responded admirably to the challenge – but that this has come at a cost.

The reports detail how expenditure on repairs jumped as landlords were left with a greater number of empty homes – taking longer to let – than they were used to. Solving the problem didn’t take small sums of money, either. KHT, for example, saw its routine maintenance spend jump by £3m due to the number of empty homes increasing and the amount it spent improving their condition beyond the normal specification to attract a new audience.

They were far from alone in taking that approach. Any improvement in void numbers in 2014/15 cost some serious money. Our new-look repairs and maintenance supplement, free with this week’s issue, provides more detail on this story, along with plenty more ideas for landlords looking to improve their performance.

In an election year where the big narrative is going to be about new-build and affordability, talking about repairs and maintenance may seem like a sideshow. Nonetheless, it is an important example of how social landlords can make a difference and have sought to ease the impact of welfare reform on individuals and communities.

This week’s news that a council has ended financial assistance for the vast majority of tenants hit by welfare cuts should act as a reminder that the problems are far from over. Discretionary housing payments were never anything more than a temporary fix – and the issues emerging in West Lancashire really do little more than foreshadow the future in many other areas. The struggle to let some homes to families who need them most isn’t likely to be an issue we can consign to history books.

It also hints at wider discussions about who social landlords house and why, that are likely to become even more prominent over the next few years. Whether we like it or not, the debate about the identity of the housing sector won’t go away – and all of these stories exemplify why.