We discuss below some of the key points arising out of the Green Paper and its 48 consultation questions.
Five principles
With quite a change of tone and burying several past policy proposals, the Green Paper sets out the Government’s five principles for a new deal for Social Housing:
The new premier league?
The Green Paper discusses the introduction of league tables where RPs’ performance will be scored against key performance indicators (KPIs) with the possibility of penalising low-performing landlords through limiting their ability to apply for grant funding.
The Green Paper indicates the KPIs could focus on:
The success of KPIs and league tables cited in the health and education sectors is debatable when Ofsted has recently criticised schools for creating “exam factories” that teach to tests when results are used for rankings. Is the Government going to learn from Ofsted’s experience?
The importance of creating ‘strong’, ‘diverse’ and ‘thriving’ communities repeats throughout the Green Paper – how will league tables assess true tenant engagement and empowerment and the need for locally set investment priorities?
We consider there’s a real risk that any introduction of league tables will focus RPs on meeting KPIs, creating a false impression of competition whilst confusing the need for accountability to residents and local stakeholders.
All change, again? Regulatory reform:
Stock transfers, back again?
Interestingly, the Government is openly questioning a stock transfer programme shifting local authority housing to community-based RPs. The Green Paper devotes a section to community-led housing and considers the benefits offered by such housing models including Community Land Trusts, Tenant Management Organisations and Housing Co-ops.
This follows the launch of ‘The Community Housing Fund’, announced on 2 July, which ring-fences £163 million to support the development of community-led housing (read our briefing on ‘The Community Housing Fund’). We are asked if there is an appetite for such a programme?
Funding
The Green Paper fails to address how new social homes will be funded. It re-iterates the Government’s commitment to a revised rent settlement of CPI +1% to 2025 and just hints at potential longer-term certainty stating it will ‘actively investigate the benefits of…providing funding certainty to some [RPs] over an even longer period’.
Local housing companies
The valuable role that these can play in increasing the overall supply of housing is recognised. It is proposed that, where Secretary of State consent is required, councils must make proposals to offer home ownership: the ambit will only be clear once the various relevant general consents are amended to cater for this.
Use of Right-to-Buy (RTB) receipts
For further reading, there is also a consultation on the use of receipts from right-to-buy sales. This is such an important and complex topic especially in relation to the future of RTB for housing association tenants; we will return to this in future briefings.
“Make a U-turn where possible”
The Green Paper contains more government U-turns on recent housing policy proposals, abolishing the following:
Whilst the Green Paper briefly mentions the Government’s commitment to the Voluntary Right to Buy (VRTB), it will be interesting to watch developments given the identified funding mechanism for the VRTB, the High-Value Asset Levy, will now be scrapped.
Better late than never? We were promised “the most substantial report of its kind for a generation”. Whilst the long-awaited publication is welcome for its change of tone and abandonment of some recent policy proposals, there is no recognition of the connection between the residualisation of social housing through the RTB and lack of capital funding being key causes of the stigmatisation of social housing tenants. Without additional public funding, the affordable housing crisis will continue. The prospect of a return to more prescriptive and centralised regulation means we could confuse where accountability lies at the heart of social housing and see the blame for not delivering a greater supply of housing falling to RPs.
The Housing Crisis lives on, and there’s little meat on the bones of the Green Paper to address this yet. With a consultation period of nearly three months, it will be a while before the sector has anything concrete to work with.
Join the conversation and have your say, the consultation is open until Tuesday 6 November 2018.
If you have any questions or would like to contribute to our consultation submission, please contact Rose Klemperer or your usual ACS contact.
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