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London housing association failed to carry out up-to-date fire risk assessments

A 2,287-home London housing association failed to carry out up-to-date fire risk assessments on a number of its homes, the regulator has reported.

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London housing association failed to carry out up-to-date fire risk assessments, regulator reports #ukhousing

Central & Cecil Housing Trust keeps G2 rating #ukhousing

Central & Cecil Housing Trust “very disappointed” in failure to carry out up-to-date fire risk assessments #ukhousing

Central & Cecil Housing Trust has kept its G2 governance rating from the Regulator of Social Housing after making improvements following a downgrade from the highest G1 rating in January last year, but identified two other issues while making these improvements.

The regulator said the association needed to improve its risk management and develop a “comprehensive” asset management strategy.

As the association began to address these areas it received allegations about fraudulent activity in its repairs and maintenance department and in the awarding of contracts. An independent investigation did not find any evidence to back up these allegations but it did identify a number of weaknesses within the department.


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Separately, the association discovered a number of its homes had not had a fire risk assessment in a number of years.

The association reported this to the regulator and it was placed under review in August last year.

The regulator concluded that the failure to carry out up-to-date fire risk assessments was a breach of the Home Standard and was “serious detriment”.

When it came to the association’s governance, the regulator said improvements had been made since last year and the findings of the independent reviews had given the regulator enough assurance that the association was meeting expectations in this area, but improvements still needed to be made in delivering value for money and asset management.

The association still faces “material financial exposure” relating to its sales and development activity over the next three years, the regulator said.

Julia Ashley, chief executive of Central & Cecil, said: “Through a deep review of our data, we discovered that a number of fire risk assessments had been outstanding for a number of years. We quickly rectified this situation and can confirm that all of our risk assessments are up to date and our quality of reporting improved to prevent further re-occurrence.

“We also found that our management of repairs contracts required some improvement and quickly rectified this to ensure that we continue to demonstrate value for money to our stakeholders.

“We were very disappointed to have discovered these issues and are confident that measures are in place to ensure that we continue to provide safe and comfortable homes for our residents and deliver our ‘Fit Future’ ambitions.”

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