You are viewing 1 of your 1 free articles
Housing sector has lost ‘empathy’, says tenant body leader
The chief executive of a sector-wide tenant engagement body has said the housing sector has lost “empathy” during a discussion about the poor conditions of some social housing properties.
Jenny Osbourne, chief executive at Tpas England, also told the Housing 2021 conference in Manchester today that the sector employed “some of the wrong people with the wrong values” over the past decade.
She was speaking during a panel discussion about the new consumer regulation arm of the Regulator of Social Housing (RSH), which is being introduced following the Social Housing White Paper and will see the regulator given more power to intervene on disrepair issues.
All members of the panel said they were not surprised by the recent investigation by ITV News that highlighted the terrible conditions within properties owned by a number of councils and major housing associations.
In response to a question by Inside Housing on the matter, Ms Osbourne said: “That’s what we’ve lost a little bit along the way, some empathy.”
READ MORE
She added: “When a phone rings from a tenant to report a repair, are our staff handling it with empathy by saying ‘how can I help this tenant? I hear what they are saying’. Not ‘how can I get them off the phone? I don’t believe them’. That’s the question we have to ask ourselves.”
Over the summer ITV News has exposed issues such as mould, damp and disrepair within properties owned by landlords including L&Q, Clarion and Croydon Council.
Kate Dodsworth, who was appointed as the first ever director of consumer regulation at the RSH earlier this year, said that she was not necessarily surprised by the conditions revealed in the ITV investigation, but that she did not think the issues were “universal”.
“There are pockets of poor practice and poor stock, which is leading to those problems,” she said.
Earlier in the session, Ms Dodworth advised social landlords to urgently fix any issues similar to the ones exposed by ITV.
She said: “If you know you have any of those issues that have been highlighted, then fix them. Fix them now and fix them quickly and do not wait for me and the regulator to find them… If those issues are complex and are going to take time to fix, then communicate clearly. Communicate your timelines, work in partnership with tenants and make people see where you’re trying to get to.”
Fayann Simpson, resident board member and senior independent director at L&Q, said there is “great service at L&Q” but acknowledged that there had also been some “disappointing service”.
She said: “If we really see those residents in those situations we will make the right decisions and act quickly, so it’s about thinking why that didn’t happen?”
Sign up for our asset management newsletter
Already have an account? Click here to manage your newsletters
