Issue - meetings

The Assistant Director of Housing Management & Enforcement presented the report to the Board.

The Council was one of the first to be inspected under the new inspection regime and had received a C2 Grading (C1 being the highest achievable, C4 the lowest).

The C2 Grading recognised that the Council had provided assurance, met the Consumer Standards in many areas, and had identified areas where improvement was needed.

A comprehensive Improvement Plan had been devised to show how the Council would drive improvement and demonstrate to the Regulator that weaknesses had been addressed – the Council had met with the Regulator on 5 occasions since inspection, most recently 17^th July 2025.

A summary of progress to date on the 4 key areas of improvement was attached at Appendix 1.

92.7% of the Council’s housing stock had been surveyed (350 properties had not been inspected).

It was intended for properties to be surveyed every 5 years or via a rolling stock programme – the Executive would be presented both options October 2025.

To identify trends and drive improvement, the Council had established the role of Housing Performance Manager.  The Housing Performance Manager was introduced and shared previous knowledge and experience as a Housing Options Officer.

The Assistant Director of Housing Management & Enforcement explained the Tenant Census had been undertaken to establish, amongst other matters, basic information on tenancy household (incl. ages, languages and any disabilities within tenant households).

To a question on future access to properties currently proving challenging (whether deliberate or not), the Assistant Director of Housing Management & Enforcement informed communication with the Council’s Legal Team had taken place to agree a process to gain access to every property (especially for the gas checks required annually).

It was noted several of the 350 properties not surveyed had been due to the inflexible arrangements of these households’ schedules.  For the households which were proving intentionally challenging, injunctions would be utilised.

RESOLVED that the Board note comments of the Improvement Plan.