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RSH publishes 34 strapline judgements
England’s social housing regulator has today confirmed its gradings for 34 providers.
The Regulator of Social Housing (RSH) issued strapline judgements upholding G1/V1 grades on governance and financial viability – the highest possible – for 22 housing associations.
Those included 70,000-home landlord Places for People and 51,000-home Riverside.
A further 10 landlords retained their G1/V2 gradings, indicating compliance with the RSH’s financial viability standard but a need to manage “material risks” to ensure that remains the case.
G15 member Network Homes, which owns around 20,000 homes, was among the providers to receive a G1/V2 grading.
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Progress Housing Group kept its G2/V1 grading, indicating compliance with governance standards but a need to improve its arrangements.
The Preston-based landlord, which owns and manages around 11,000 homes, was downgraded by the regulator in February over health and safety concerns.
Connexus Housing was kept at G2/V2, the lowest possible compliant grading.
The 10,500-home association was initially downgraded on governance in November 2018 after a whistleblower raised concerns about historical “procurement and probity” issues.
It then retained its G2/V2 grading in October last year despite breaching the RSH’s Home Standard – having failed to fix a heating appliance that it knew was unsafe in a home where a fire-related death later occurred.
All 34 of today’s strapline judgements follow routine annual stability checks by the RSH.
Last month, the regulator announced it will publish weekly regulatory judgements for providers which have been subject to a stability check until February, to deal with the high volume of judgements at this time of year.
It will continue to publish narrative judgements coming out of in-depth assessments or reactive engagement on the last Wednesday of each month, while those arising from enforcement action will remain published on an ad hoc basis.
Regulatory judgements published on 9 December
G1/V1
Arawak Walton Housing Association
Arches Housing
Bernicia Group
Bournville Village Trust
Cobalt Housing
Connect Housing
Croydon Churches Housing Association
Empowering People Inspiring Communities
Golden Lane Housing
Havebury Housing Partnership
Housing Solutions
Karbon Homes
Leeds Federated Housing Association
Manningham Housing Association
One Manchester
PA Housing
Places for People
Riverside Group
Saffron Housing Trust
Selwood Housing
Two Rivers Housing
Weaver Vale Housing Trust
G1/V2
Acis Group
Bolton at Home
Byker Community Trust
Network Homes
Newlon Housing Trust
Ocean Housing
One Vision Housing
Rochdale Boroughwide Housing
Salix Homes
Tower Hamlets Community Housing
G2/V1
Progress Housing Group
G2/V2
Connexus Housing
Regulatory judgements in England explained
The Regulator of Social Housing publishes regulatory judgements for all providers owning 1,000 or more social housing homes.
These judgements set out whether the provider is complying with the regulator’s governance and financial viability standards.
The regulator carries out an assessment either through a scheduled in-depth assessment, or reactive engagement (in which the regulator acts following information about a provider).
It then awards the provider a rating from one to four for financial viability (V) and a separate rating from one to four for governance (G).
Providers must score two or higher in both categories to be judged as complying with the standards.
As providers have increasingly taken on more risk to cross-subsidise social and affordable housing delivery through market-facing activity, the regulator has changed a number of associations’ viability ratings from V1 to V2.
The regulator often categorises this kind of regulatory action as ‘regrades’ rather than downgrades. Click here to read more.
Key to ratings:
V1/G1: Compliant
V2/G2: Compliant
V3/G3: Non-compliant and intensive regulatory engagement needed
V4/G4: Non-complaint, serious failures, leading to either intensive regulatory engagement or the use of enforcement powers
Rating straplines in full:
Governance ratings:
G1: The provider meets our governance requirements.
G2: The provider meets our governance requirements but needs to improve some aspects of its governance arrangements to support continued compliance.
G3: The provider does not meet our governance requirements. There are issues of serious regulatory concern and in agreement with us the provider is working to improve its position.
G4: The provider does not meet our governance requirements. There are issues of serious regulatory concern and the provider is subject to regulatory intervention or enforcement action.
Financial viability ratings:
V1: The provider meets our viability requirements and has the financial capacity to deal with a wide range of adverse scenarios.
V2: The provider meets our viability requirements. It has the financial capacity to deal with a reasonable range of adverse scenarios but needs to manage material risks to ensure continued compliance.
V3: The provider does not meet our viability requirements. There are issues of serious regulatory concern and, in agreement with us, the provider is working to improve its position.
V4: The provider does not meet our viability requirements. There are issues of serious regulatory concern and the provider is subject to regulatory intervention or enforcement action.
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