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London housing officers to work with Home Office on anti-gang ‘enforcement action’
Housing officers in three London boroughs are set to work with the Home Office to take “enforcement action” around violence in social housing, Inside Housing can exclusively reveal.
Under a partnership struck between the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea (RBKC), Westminster Council, the London Borough of Hammersmith & Fulham (LBHF) and the Home Office, a new unit will be launched in April.
The three boroughs submitted a joint bid to the Home Office’s Early Intervention Youth Fund and in November were awarded a portion of the £4.2m allocated to the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime.
Housing officers for the three councils and housing associations in the area will work with the new Home Office-funded unit.
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RBKC revealed the plan to Inside Housing in response to a Freedom of Information Act request about links between council housing management and anti-gang policing.
A total of 18 other London councils responded to the request. Of these, five – Barnet, Haringey, Hackney, Croydon and Waltham Forest – said they have ‘Integrated Gangs Units’, which work with housing officers.
LBHF also confirmed that since 2010, it has issued 25 eviction orders from council housing based on one family member’s involvement in gangs, as well as 53 possession orders, 29 of which were suspended.
It said: “This could be any household member, including the tenant.”
The RBKC response said: “The borough is currently working to more closely align services to support young people and residents who are at risk from involvement in serious youth violence.”
It added: “The unit will work in partnership with council housing management, and all other registered social landlords in Kensington and Chelsea, to provide positive interventions for residents who are at risk from involvement in violence, and where necessary enforcement action to safeguard all residents from violence and drug dealing in social housing.”
When contacted for comment by Inside Housing, the three councils involved declined to comment further on the plans, saying they had not been launched yet.
The involvement of social landlords in combatting gang violence has been a source of controversy in the past. Last year, both a police commander and a government minister called for the parents of violent gang members to be evicted from social housing.
The challenges of this approach were analysed by Matthew Bailes, chief executive of Paradigm Housing Group, in an article for Inside Housing.
Other than LBHF, the other 18 councils said they had never asked for eviction orders based on a family member’s involvement in gangs.
