John Bryant, a policy leader at the National Housing Federation specialising in accountability in housing
Work with tenants to build a mutual approach to accountability: The mechanism for effective accountability, be it a tenant scrutiny panel or some other approach, is best determined by dialogue between each social landlord and its tenants to decide what works best for them. A centralised regulatory approach isn't a very effective: in some cases, it produces an attitude of bare compliance. The lesson I'd draw from our regulatory experience over the years is that we need landlords to think more about how to please their tenants and less about how to please the regulator.
Housing providers should seek advice about accountability then make their own decisions: I certainly don't want to dismiss the sector's past regulatory experiences, some of which have been very positive and constructive. But too much of centralised regulatory approach was heavy handed and wasteful. The risk is that if the sector took a similarly approach, the outcome might be just as unsatisfactory. This is not to say, however, that a trade body like the NHF shouldn't try to raise standards in the sector, for instance, we have a suite of Codes of Excellence covering governance, service delivery and accountability, and Standards of Conduct. It's possible we may do more of this sort of thing in the future. But our approach in these codes isn't prescriptive. Instead, we set out the issues and the policy considerations but then leave housing associations to work out how to address these in the light of their own circumstances, in liaison with their tenants. Two HAs might look at the same issue and develop entirely different ways of dealing with it.
Richard St John Williams is a social housing partner at law firm Cobbetts LLP
Ensure no-one slips through the net: It was inevitable that the Tenant Services Authority (TSA) would be scrapped. The re-integration with the HCA may appear outwardly to be re-organising the deck chair again; however, there are more profound issues to be unpacked - particularly, the separate functions of grant provider, regulator and facilitator (when organisations run into extreme difficulties). Regulation will inevitably be lighter in the years ahead; as there is a perception that regulation grows to meet the number of regulators and many housing providers may welcome this. However, given the crucial role housing providers play in supporting the most vulnerable in society, care is needed to ensure that failures do not make the vulnerable more vulnerable.
Simon Devitt works for Bespoke Property Group where he specialises in strategic management and affordable housing policy
Housing providers should take accountability for themselves: Ultimately the delivery of high quality and responsive services should not rely on the existence and operation of a regulator but is a matter of the governance of an registered social landlord (RSL). It is the responsibility of the board to ensure that the organisation operates appropriately and openly - not because of the threat of inspection and regulation. The challenge is how this can be realised in increasingly large, diverse and complex organisations
Ensure tenants are protected: The position with regard to the private rented sector (PRS) is an interesting one - particularly given the undertaking to the Treasury that the new "affordable rent" product will not in itself result in and significant increase in the overall cost in housing benefit. The clear implication is that the government envisages greater mobility between the social and private rented sector. Also, given the current low levels of new home building - with no prospect of any immediate increase - it is inevitable that there will be changes in homelessness legislation and in areas of high need local authorities will be discharging their responsibilities through tenancies in the private sector. Notwithstanding the problems that do occur with RSLs, at least they do have processes for dealing with complaints and problems -albeit honoured sometimes more in breach than observance. These processes generally do not exist in PRS and tenants with major problems only recourse is through law.
Amanda Tomlinson, assistant chief executive at Black Country Housing and former managing director of HomeZone
Involve tenants in accountability policy: One of the ways of making organisations accountable to customers is through tenant scrutiny. Where tenants are involved in reviewing the way we deliver services, they are far more challenging than an annual conversation with the regulator could ever be. At Black Country we've only recently established our tenant scrutiny panel, and our intention is to ensure regular reporting into our governance structures, so not only held to account by tenants, but also our board members.
Peter McCormack, chief executive at Derwent Living
Use social media: I think landlords do have a clear responsibility to provide a variety of mechanisms for residents to raise concerns and be involved. This ranges from effective complaints procedures, to scrutiny and residents panels looking at the bigger picture, to mass communication as a way of getting views such as texting and social media. As private organisations in receipt of some public money social landlords are a perfect example of the 'big society', we work hard to let people know how to connect with us and who governs us. There is always room for improvement in communication though.
Eileen Mallon, strategic director of housing, planning and regeneration, and regulatory services at Charnwood Borough Council
Help tenants to get involved by using mentors to explain processes: Since setting up the ALMO in Dec 2007, one of the areas we have looked at is involving tenants in shaping the services they receive, and being involved in the decisions around that. The ALMO has developed with tenants a new structure which introduces a formal scrutiny mechanism for customers. Tenants will have mentors to assist them in picking service areas that they want scrutinising, and service quality groups made up of tenants will look in detail at the service area to see how it is being delivered. Their findings will be presented to the ALMO board or committees. The aim is to make this independent and involve a range of tenants from across the borough.
Vincenzo Rampulla is public affairs officer at the National Landlords Association (NLA) and former DCLG policy adviser
All landlords need to be accredited: Agencies and national/local government are going to have to think more about the rented sector as a whole rather than two separate sectors. Tenants can find themselves facing the same kind of problems from both sides of the renting coin. The key does seem, in the PRS at least, to know what type of landlord you're renting from right at the start. That is why things like landlord accreditation are so important.
Ensure all voices can be heard when asking for tenant feed-back: Increasing the route for enabling tenants to communicate with landlords effectively is a good thing, but we need to ensure that it isn't a case of who shouts loudest or has the best Twitter approach who gets the best service. The effectiveness of sharing experiences depends on there being a representative range of them. Something like a trip adviser-style approach to social and private renting raises all sorts of issues as well as opportunities.
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