Spinning plates
It seems like we are always spinning plates in the world of social housing, but it would be an understatement to say we have quite a few in the air at the moment.
Whether it’s regulatory matters or compliance, seeking opportunities to build more affordable homes or making our current homes more energy efficient and future-proof, it’s fair to say we haven’t been busier as a housing association – and I know this is echoed throughout the whole sector.
Regardless how many plates are spinning, putting our residents first always has, and always will, be our number one priority and that means making sure our homes exceed national standards and that people are very happy in them.
Our resident satisfaction surveys say this is the case, but we have to be able to react quickly when ‘new’ things come along, such as fire safety, tackling damp, mould and condensation and decarbonisation.
I am pleased to say we are already addressing all of this and, for example, a recent grant via the Warm Homes Fund will enable us to speed up our net zero retrofit work, which is not always easy given the age of many of our properties but something we know is important and has to be done if the UK is to achieve its 2050 net zero target.
We like building new homes and therefore welcome the recent Government announcement of an extra £2 billion in grant funding for the development of affordable homes, which will contribute to the 1.5 million new homes it wants to see being built before the next general election.
Speeding up planning decisions is key to this and we recently received permission for a scheme (which is still subject to final funding approval) which has been over four years in the making due to planning ‘issues’.
The length of time it has taken means we have ‘lost’ our grant for this scheme but, yes once again by spinning plates, we were thankfully able to re-allocate to enable us to carry out fire remediation work at one of our sheltered housing schemes, as well as retrofit work on some of our existing properties to get them an Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) rating of C.
There are currently around 70,000 people registered as homeless, of which a large proportion are of retirement age. We have a responsibility to people because housing doesn’t just put a roof over their heads, it also helps their health, it helps their well-being, it helps their employment prospects and it helps to keep them out of hospital.
As an Association, we would love to build 100 properties a year, but we are at a size where we can deliver in the order of 15 a year, but it obviously counts.
We’re also working hard at the moment to make sure we can demonstrate that we meet the new consumer standards the Government introduced, and we just hope that things will calm down a little bit at some stage so we can focus more of our time on delivery.
Hence why the plates are always spinning!
