Scrutinising Housing Services May we take this opportunity

Scrutinising Housing Services
Issue 38
The Housing (Scotland Act ) 2010 created 2 new fundamental influences in the social
housing sector. The Scottish Social Housing Charter (SSHC) and the Scottish Housing
Regulator (SHR) Together they have created a new environment in which registered social
landlords, councils and their tenants, must work in partnership to achieve positive outcomes
for tenants and other service users in Scotland. This means that landlords must deliver
quality services, involve their tenants in assessing the performance of these services and be
able to demonstrate value for money. Tenant scrutiny and landlord self assessment are now
key priorities on the Scottish Housing agenda.
From July to November 2013, the Council’s Housing Department Tenant Participation Team
began a consultation exercise to recruit volunteers to form a Scrutiny Steering group, to
develop a Scrutiny Panel and agree a formal Scrutiny Framework for Scrutinising Housing
services. Over 2014 a Steering group was formed which led on to forming a Scrutiny Panel.
Names of tenants interested in getting involved in Mystery Shopping and Tenant Led
Inspections were also taken.
A purpose of the Scrutiny Panel is to work together to scrutinise the services provided by
their landlord and up to date, 3 services have been scrutinised. Three Sub groups of the
Panel scrutinised Lettings, Anti Social Behaviour and Repairs, all of which have been
identified by tenants as priorities for Scrutiny. Improvements to these services and actions to
be taken have been identified by the Panel and will inform the Customer Report.
Anyone interested in getting involved in Mystery Shopping or Tenant Led inspections should
contact Gillian Wilson on Dundee 307297.
If you would like take up FREE membership with DFTA we would love to hear from you.
Phone Dundee 305718. Also check out our website at dfta.co.uk for up to date information.
May we take this opportunity to wish all our readers
a Merry Christmas and Best Wishes for the New Year
From
THE DUNDEE FEDERATION OF
TENANTS ASSOCIATIONS
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Newsletter from the Dundee Federation of Tenants Associations - December 2014
Dundee City Council is currently consulting its tenants on what their rents should be and
tenants are being asked to choose 1 of 3 options.
Option 1 is a 2.5% increase with the average weekly increase being £1.69 and a maximum
weekly increase of £2.50 which will Maintain the Current Service Standard and Include £1.2
million Capital Expenditure to restart the new build programme with the provision of disabled
access housing. Planned maintenance increased by £692 thousand to allow for environmental
neighbourhood initiatives and improvements with cyclical maintenance
Option 2 is a 2.75% increase with the average weekly increase being £1.86 and a maximum
weekly increase of £2.50 which delivers the same as option 1 but includes additional Capital Expenditure of £1.2 million to advance the Energy Efficiency Programme.
Option 3 is a 3% increase with an average weekly increase of £2.03 and a maximum weekly
increase of £2.75 which will deliver the same as options 1 and 2 but include a further £1.2
million Capital Expenditure for a new build programme with the provision of disabled access
housing. Service charges are being maintained at the current level.
You can also jot down your option, 1, 2 or 3 on a bit of paper, include your name and
address, pop it into an envelope and send it to Dundee City Council, FREEPOST TY 330,
Quality & Performance Unit, Dundee, DD1 9XE (no stamp needed) Your names will be
included in a PRIZE draw to win a 22” Toshiba DVD Combi. You can text your view to “your
say” RENT OPTION 1, 2 or 3 to 07539 242 303 or email “your say” to rentconsulation@dundeecity.gov.uk.
Check out other information in relation to this at
www.dundeecity.gov.uk/rentconsultation.
The consultation finishes on the 31 December 2014 so you need to get a move on! It is really
important that you take the opportunity to select which option you think best and make your
views known to the Council.
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ESTATE WALKABOUTS
Scottish Housing Quality Standard (SHQS)
At the last Focus group meeting in November, it was confirmed that all council houses, apart
from those with temporary exemption, will meet the “Standard” by March 2015.
Since the last issue of the Federation News in April this year,
the Federation has been working on a few issues related to
concerns raised by Registered Tenants Organisations (RTOs)
from areas across Dundee.
One of these was Estate Walkabouts which we touched on in
the April edition. At that time we were waiting for a response from Housing to the
information and recommendations sent from the meeting with the RTOS. The response
from Housing was very positive and it was accepted that there should be consistency in
terms of a Housing Department lead officer for the organisation of regular walkabouts,
naming the officers responsible from the East and West offices.
The West office used a different proforma for recording which had been hugely beneficial in
terms of providing a range of information relating to attendance, actions required and
outcomes from these. The East office will now adopt the same proforma as the West office.
The terminology in the proformas was also questioned as it appeared to be not entirely
accurate e.g. If housing staff mark a repair job as complete it means the job has been
done, not just that a repair has been logged. This should lead to a fairly comprehensive
database/spreadsheet for the East office to add to the one in place in the West office.
Housing officers always attend walkabouts and it appears from the spreadsheet analysis in
West office that a very significant number of all outcomes arising from Estate Walkabouts
relate back to the Environment Department, in one way or another.
Housing staff organise and deliver 28 Walkabouts in the West area and 14 in the East,
which is a total of 42 a year. Housing was progressing work on Tenancy Sustainment and
what this will look like, therefore there may be a need to take a wider look at Estate
Walkabout policies, procedures and practices as things develop.
The SHQS 2, known as the Energy Efficiency Standard for Social Housing has been in play
for some time now and housing staff have made great strides in securing funding towards
upgrading the heating efficiency of some homes. For example; External and internal cladding
where more appropriate, and the installation of District Heating systems which had been
installed in the multis at the bottom of the Hilltown and in the Lochee multis and low rise flats.
Graham Street has been completed, Boots Lawton is work in progress and Arkley Street will
start after this.
News of the use of District Heating Systems in the Dundee multis travelled as far afield as
Edinburgh and we were approached by the Edinburgh Federation who asked if we could
organise a visit to Dundee for their multi tenants to see how the systems operated, how the
cladding had been done and how this benefitted tenants. They were also interested in how
anti social behaviour was dealt with and what support there was for tenants who needed
assistance to sustain their tenancies. They also wanted to meet tenants who lived in the
multis. DFTA contacted Kevin Jamieson, DCC Housing Regeneration Officer who helped us
organise the visit. Tenants from Lochee and Hilltown multis came along to meet the
Edinburgh tenants and share experiences.
The community room in the West District Housing office was used as a base for the visit and
after the group arrived and had some refreshments, they visited a Relet flat in one of the
multis, were given a tour of the District Heating System room, explanations of how it worked
how tenants were billed for heating their homes and the methods used for cladding the
multis. After the tour, the group were taken back to the West District Housing office where
they watched the Phoenix Groups “Our Multi Story” DVD before meeting representatives
from the Anti Social Behaviour Team, Housing Support Team and Dundee Energy Advice
Project who spoke about their work and answered questions from the Edinburgh group. The
visit was very successful and the Edinburgh Federation Chairperson was talking about a
return visit with their Convenor of Housing.
Another issue the Federation raised was the Sheltered Housing service charges. Tenants
service charges and housing cover the cost of maintaining and running Sheltered Lounges,
which not every sheltered tenant uses, however the Lounges are also used by the Social
Work Department who do not contribute to costs. After lengthy discussion with Housing
Management around this issue, it was recognised that the time and resources needed to
find out who used lounges, when and what for could outweigh any financial benefits.
.
Housing wants to ensure that the needs of Sheltered tenants are met by the right people
and departments. A Housing Support Officer and a Social Work officer are working
together to carry out a needs assessment of all Sheltered tenants to establish how much
need there may be for a support service. This could take a number of months as they will
have to visit all Sheltered Housing and Complexes in the city to gather information about
individual tenants needs.
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