Agenda item
Housing needs transformation project
This report provides an overview of the Housing Needs Transformation Project and updates Members on current progress. The project is part of the One Council programme and focuses on the work of the Housing Resource Centre and Housing Solutions in the Regeneration and Major Projects Department. The report also provides some information about how the impact of the project will be monitored and evaluated.
Minutes:
Perry Singh (Assistant Director – Needs and Private Sector, Housing and Community Care) introduced the report and stated that the project focused on the work of both the Housing Resource Centre and Housing Solutions. The project built on successful improvement work already undertaken by the Housing Needs service to reduce homelessness applications and use of temporary accommodation. It also interlinked with the customer service and move to the Civic Centre projects. The project was also driven by the need to address budget pressures and a 30% reduction in resources was forecast between 2010/11 and 2012/13, including reduced capital funding for new build affordable housing. The project was required to deliver £0.75m in-year savings primarily through staff reductions and there would be a need to consolidate resources and use them as efficiently as possible. The situation was compounded by changes to Housing Benefit and this would affect around 8,500 households in Brent and place pressure on preventing homelessness.
Perry Singh then outlined the three central work streams of the project, which were service transformation, accommodation management and demand management. For service transformation, a key objective was to reduce duplication, whilst rationalisation was required in respect of accommodation management and managing expectations of customers and providing clearer advice in situations where they were not eligible in the case of demand management. Perry Singh advised that it was intended to fully implement the service transformation and accommodation management work streams by March 2012, whilst demand management would continue to operate over a longer period depending on the progress of legislation and would not commence until the autumn of 2011. Another central aim of the project was to provide a seamless customer journey from beginning to end, whilst the commissioning aspect of the project aimed to improve procurement. Perry Singh informed Members that seeing how other local authorities were addressing this issue was also being undertaken.
During Members’ discussion, Councillor Lorber commented on the large number of customers in category D of the housing waiting list and he enquired what advice were they given at the outset and did handling the number of cases of this type burden the council with additional costs. It was queried whether the length of time on the housing waiting list was still a factor in determining progress on it. Councillor Lorber sought clarification as to whether the council would have the authority to effectively eliminate category D from the housing waiting list. In respect of categories A and B, Councillor Lorber asked about the proportion of customers that made bids through Locata. Details were sought with regard to the extent of changes in commissioning and was the customer journey objective working effectively. Councillor B M Patel enquired if there were other ways to get on the housing waiting list and bid for housing other than on-line and whether assistance was provided in completing the necessary forms.
The Chair expressed concern about rationalisation of frontline staff and enquired how a customer-focused approach could be maintained. He sought further details as to how the service transformation work stream would operate and what were the principles that the Project Board was working too. Further information was also requested regarding on who was being consulted. With regard to improving customer satisfaction, the Chair asked over what time period this would be monitored. A response was also sought in respect of the implications of the Localism Bill on housing.
With the approval of the Chair, Councillor S Choudhary addressed the committee. He stressed the importance of informing those customers whose chances of obtaining housing was virtually nil that they should be informed of this at the earliest opportunity.
In reply to issues raised, Perry Singh explained that frontline staff had not been reduced, however there would not be extra staff to deal with the increasing demand. In order to be more effective in addressing the greater demand, cutting out instances of duplication of work was being undertaken, although Perry Singh acknowledged that it was difficult to envisage exactly how things would work as there were so many unknown variables, however the changes were absolutely necessary. Members heard that consultants Ad Esse were undertaking workshops with frontline staff to assist with the service transformation work stream and a recent workshop had focused on what information to collect. It was anticipated that the Information Centre would provide considerable insight into where work should be concentrated on. Perry Singh advised that the Project Board’s principles included bringing teams together and devising a clear strategy for procurement which was critical to the future of the service. A framework contract involving other West London boroughs would be commencing this week. In respect of consultation, this would involve an extensive list of stakeholders including housing associations and voluntary sector organisations and reviewing internal council processes. There would also be a wide consultation exercise with regard to future housing needs policy.
Perry Singh explained that category D waiting list customers were advised that it was unlikely that they would be successful in obtaining housing. However, he advised that there would be improvements to ensure customers in such situations were fully aware of this, including clear messages on the on-line service and also reducing the number of forms that needed to be completed. In addition, by answering a series of ten questions, it could be quickly ascertained if a customer would fall under category D. The on-line registration process would also be simplified, although processing category D claims did add to council costs. It was possible to suggest as part of policy that category D be eliminated in the future, as well as to no longer include people on the waiting list who lived outside of the borough. Members heard that the length of time on the waiting list was no longer used as a qualifying criteria and the current system split claims into four broad bands to prevent customers from exploiting the system to gain points to push them higher up the waiting list. Around 98% of housing bids were now undertaken on-line and although the proportion of categories A and B bidders was relatively small, this was being monitored and the council sometimes made bids on behalf of the most vulnerable customers. Concerning procurement and commissioning, action was being taken to reduce problems in respect of obtaining and retaining accommodation stock and improving dialogue with private landlords in respect of using their property for housing needs and arrangements for when contracts with landlords were coming close to the end. Perry Singh advised that work continued in developing the ideal customer journey and in particular was focusing on reducing the number of hand-offs between staff during the course of interaction with a customer. It was anticipated that bringing staff together under a single Brent Accommodation Team would enable a seamless customer journey and eliminate duplication.
Turning to customer satisfaction, Perry Singh advised that a recent sample survey had already indicated that this had improved, however further benchmarking exercises needed to be conducted and it was important that the questionnaires ascertained as to whether customers were happy with the service provided, as opposed to satisfaction with a particular outcome, such as securing a house. The committee heard that the Localism Bill was not anticipated to result in any significant changes in terms of housing allocation, however there was likely to be greater flexibility afforded to tenancy strategy including length of tenancies and this could be used as a lever to manage tenancy arrears. However, discharging tenants to the private sector would become more problematic because of the changes to Housing Benefit.
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