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L&Q racial harassment case could be repeated, report warns

A racial harassment case which saw L&Q fined £31,000 by a court after one of its tenants had to flee her home to escape death threats could be repeated, a highly critical report into the incident has warned.

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L&Q’s head office in east London (picture: Sonny Dhamu)
L&Q’s head office in east London (picture: Sonny Dhamu)
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A racial harassment case which saw L&Q fined £31,000 by a court after one of its tenants had to flee her home to escape death threats could be repeated, a highly critical report into the incident has warned #UKhousing

An independent review said ineffective handling of complaints involving racist abuse at the giant housing association means it is “not possible to give assurance that another similar case could not happen again”.

Failure to “deal racist incidents in a timely manner” leaves L&Q “open to the charge that is enabling racism”, it added.

One complaint file found during the review showed a case of racial harassment and intimidation that had been ongoing for up to four years.

In December 2020, L&Q was ordered to pay £31,000 in compensation to Tia Jones, a single Black woman who was forced to leave her London home in 2015 following months of racist abuse by her upstairs neighbours.

It emerged that the flat’s previous occupant, a Black man with learning difficulties, reported to L&Q that he had experienced racist and threatening behaviour from the same neighbours. Information about this was stored in the landlord’s system, but Ms Jones was told there was no record of anti-social behaviour (ASB) at the property.

Ms Jones continued to pay rent after leaving the flat and was threatened with possession proceedings by L&Q for no longer being in occupation.


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Following the court decision, L&Q’s resident services board commissioned the review into housing management case-handling, which was carried out by Jackie Odunoye.

The review pointed to a litany of shortcomings in L&Q’s services, including “a lack of care” in some cases and a “lack of empathy evident in communications”.

It also highlighted poor record-keeping, an overly complex matrix of policies, and a focus on deadlines and processes rather than getting the right outcome for complainants.

The review set out an action plan for L&Q to improve its case-handling, which the 118,000-home landlord has promised to implement.

Changes include an increase in frontline staff, reducing the size of housing officers’ patches, training on dealing with hate crime and ASB and a new annual programme of tenancy support visits.

Gerri Scott, group director of customer services at L&Q, said: “We want to build relationships based on trust, transparency and fairness, but in recent times we have seen too many cases where L&Q has simply not been good enough.

“Some of our residents in particular have been badly let down by our response to cases involving racial harassment and hate crime.

“This independent report spells out the reasons why we are not always getting it right and identifies practical solutions for fixing this. We fully accept the findings of the report and are committed to implementing the proposed action plan, with our resident services board having complete oversight of this work.”

She added that by sharing the report, L&Q hopes “to spearhead a broader debate about how we can learn and improve as a sector”.

Fayann Simpson, chair of the resident services board at L&Q, said: “I am very pleased that L&Q have engaged so honestly and transparently with this important review.

“It has enabled a robust and practical action plan for improvement to be developed.

“Successful implementation and delivery of this plan will allow L&Q to reconnect with residents and rebuild trust by improving the quality, consistency and timeliness of case work, improving ASB and complaints-handling, and embedding a culture of equity and fairness.”

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