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Clarion cleared by RSH following ITV investigation
The UK’s largest housing association has been cleared of a standards breach by the sector’s regulator following an investigation sparked by a television news report into the conditions on one of its estates in London.
Clarion, which owns and manages around 125,000 homes across the country, referred itself to the Regulator of Social Housing (RSH) after the report aired in June.
ITV News and My London spoke to unhappy residents at Clarion’s Eastfields Estate in Merton, south London, with images showing vermin infestations and widespread disrepair. In many cases, residents had to wait long periods for issues to be rectified by the landlord, including one family who had lived for eight months without lights on the top floor of their home.
At the time, the landlord apologised to residents and admitted its service “had not been to the standard that we would like”.
Minister Luke Hall later revealed in parliament that the RSH was “considering information received from Clarion Housing Association about the Eastfields Estate” with a view to deciding “whether there is evidence of systemic failure that would indicate a breach of regulatory standards”.
In an unusual statement issued today, the RSH said: “We received a referral from Clarion Housing Association in relation to homes on its Eastfields Estate in Merton.
“While there were clearly individual repairs issues which required resolution, our investigation did not find evidence of systemic or organisational failure which indicates a breach of the consumer standards.”
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Its conclusion means Clarion will retain its G1/V1 regulatory grading, the highest possible.
The RSH’s investigation came soon after a separate five-month probe into Clarion, which centred on repairs and complaint-handling concerns raised by a group of councillors in Tower Hamlets.
In late March, the regulator concluded that while it found “individual incidents of service failures”, there was no “evidence of systemic failings by Clarion which would necessitate regulatory action”.
Clare Miller, chief executive of Clarion Housing Group, said: “We welcome the decision of the regulator to maintain the G1/V1 status for Clarion Housing Group.
“I am proud of the role we play as a social landlord to 350,000 residents across the country and the contribution we make as a developer of new homes. But we are also an organisation determined to continually improve the service we provide.
“At the Eastfields Estate in Merton, we apologised for past mistakes and have taken action to improve conditions on the estate. We are listening to residents and working closely with the council, to ensure improvements in living conditions now and drive forward our plan for regeneration in the future.
“I have commissioned a review of lessons learned from Eastfields and we will be publishing the results in the autumn.
“This will sit alongside a plan that renews our commitment to our residents, comprising everything from investment in their homes to ensuring a regular and visible Clarion presence in their local communities.”
Since 2012, the regulator has only been able to intervene on consumer issues where it finds evidence of “serious detriment” to tenants.
In the Social Housing White Paper, published in October in response to the Grenfell Tower fire, the government laid out proposals for a return to a proactive system of consumer regulation.
ITV has run a series of reports on incidents of social housing residents facing squalid conditions, beginning with an exposé of shocking mould problems at a Croydon Council-owned tower block.
The investigation resulted in the regulator stepping in and saw Croydon Council become only the second-ever social landlord to be found in breach of the Tenant Involvement and Empowerment Standard.
In its report, the RSH said that some of the homes the council managed were “uninhabitable and unsafe” with tenants at “risk of serious harm” because of the conditions.
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