Lee Sugden, Chief Executive, Salix Homes and NHC Board member

At the last count, there were over 600,000 empty homes in England – that equates to two years’ worth of the Government’s targets for new home completions.

Of those, more than 200,000 are classed as long-term empty, in that they’ve stood empty for more than six months, and this represents around 1% of the total housing stock in the country.

At the time of a national housing crisis, surely common sense would say that a crucial tactic for tackling this growing crisis would be to make better use of this stock we’ve already got.

With more than a million people on housing waiting lists up and down the country, it’s a travesty that houses are stood empty in our communities.

Obviously, it’s not as simple as just moving people in, firstly we need to understand the reasons why a home may lie empty.

Properties may be empty because the owner is in hospital or moved into a care home, they could even be enjoying a stay at Her Majesty’s pleasure.

There can be any number of reasons why a home is empty at any particular point in time, but we can’t ignore the fact that a good proportion of these properties stand unused and neglected, and with a little investment, could be brought back into use to not only provide homes for those who need them, but to help regenerate our communities.

In some areas there is a great deal of work being done by local authorities, housing providers and private landlords to tackle empty homes and the success of such projects can be seen in Salford.

Ten years ago, there were over 3,000 empty homes in Salford – that figure now stands at just over 1,000, a reduction of almost 70% – or about 1% of the city’s housing stock. Nationally, long-term empty homes have only been reduced by half that, so Salford is certainly doing something right.

We work with our partners here to utilise the Government’s Empty Homes Scheme, which ran until 2016, and provides grants to gap-fund refurbishment work. The condition being that the landlord has to guarantee the homes would be let as affordable housing for a minimum of five years. We then let the homes via our ethical private lettings agency – Salix Living.

It’s win-win for all involved. More affordable homes available for people in housing-need, a guaranteed income for the homeowner and the blight of empty buildings gone from our communities. On many occasions, this additional supply of homes to the market place has given a roof over the head of someone at risk of homelessness – an outcome that gives me a great deal of satisfaction.

But it’s not just empty homes. In Salford we’ve set our targets on empty buildings in general, which have so far included shops, pubs and even an old job centre, which we’ve successfully transformed into housing.

And the success of such schemes is now capturing national interest, after Salix Homes was this month featured in a new BBC1 documentary series – The Empty Housing Scandal – presented by the tenacious Matt Allwright, of Watchdog and One Show fame.

The series shines a spotlight on Britain’s empty homes scandal, and we were incredibly proud to show Matt some of the work we are doing to turn the tide and transform these eyesore buildings into desperately needed affordable housing.

It’s a reflection of the times, but society has changed. High streets are in decline and last orders are being called at boozers up and down the country, leaving these once thriving community hubs deserted and neglected.

Repurposing these abandoned buildings, which are often in key central locations, is about more than providing much-needed homes, it’s also about tackling the effects these eyesore sites have on communities, where they are often a magnet for anti-social behaviour.

With a little investment and creative thinking, such projects are helping to breathe life back into our high streets, regenerate communities and crucially helping to tackle the housing crisis.

You can catch The Empty Housing Scandal on iPlayer and Salix Homes features in episodes three and four.

Thirteen’s employability service has launched a new scheme to support young people aged 16-24 from County Durham into work (funded by DurhamWorks as part of the Youth Employment Initiative).

Over recent years Thirteen has extended its employability portfolio, delivering services for both tenants and the wider public.  Our support progressing individuals into work has provided many benefits to both communities and Thirteen in terms of social inclusion, health and wellbeing, financial stability and tenancy sustainment.

More recently Thirteen has commenced delivery of Routeways in both Hospitality and Customer Service, which provide a level two qualification and guaranteed interviews for live job vacancies with local employers.

Both Routeways are being delivered monthly in various localities across County Durham. Courses are initially scheduled to be delivered in central Durham and future delivery is likely to include Newton Aycliffe, Bishop Auckland, Chester le Street, Spennymoor and Stanley.  Delivery will also be expanded to other areas based upon need.

One of the first businesses to offer employment opportunities upon Routeway completion is the Radisson Blu hotel in Durham City.

Karen Kenmare, Senior Housing Related Support Manager, from Thirteen said: “This is a fantastic opportunity for young people in County Durham to gain valuable skills and a qualification that will stand them in good stead in the future.”

“The courses will give training and confidence, with a genuine job interview at the end.  Following the course young people will also be given intensive 1-1 support from Thirteen’s employability service to help progress them into work.”

“It’s important that local and national companies invest in the career prospects of our young people and we’re pleased that the Radisson Blu is working with us to offer potential roles for willing and enthusiastic candidates.”

Shirlynn Lim, General Manager from Raddison Blu, said: “The culture of our business worldwide is to provide meaningful employment, develop our team’s talents and increase young people’s employability and that is why we are pleased to be working with Thirteen on this important project.

“We are very much looking forward to meeting the young people who complete the course and who, hopefully, may become valued members of our team in the future.”

Places on Thirteen’s Customer Service and Hospitality Routeway courses can be booked via:

Telephone:      07789 923490 / 07876 006086

Facebook:       ThirteenGroup

Website:          www.thirteengroup.co.uk/durhamrouteways

Email:              durham-routeways@thirteengroup.co.uk

The new independent Affordable Housing Commission (AHC) is chaired by Lord Best and includes housing experts and parliamentarian commissioners.   The Smith Institute will act as secretariat to the commission and the NHC will be supporting the commission by holding an event on 1 March 2019 (this event focuses on the North East and Yorkshire and Humber – there are other events taking place in other regions)

In preparation for its launch, the AHC published the results of a national poll, showing that two thirds of people believe that there is a national crisis over affordable housing and 52% believe it will get worse over the next decade.

The AHC has identified four key groups for whom the affordability of their accommodation is causing serious difficulty:

1. Struggling renters: these are required to spend more than a third of their income on rented accommodation; they are often in the private rented sector (PRS), although the problem is also evident in in the social housing sector.
2. Frustrated homeowners: those unable to buy a property without spending over a third on housing costs; many, who struggling to save and without significant parental support, are destined to remain in the PRS.
3. Those reliant on state support: households that rely on Housing Benefit/the housing component within Universal Credit, but current arrangements provide inadequate support, taking many below the poverty line.
4. Those who face affordability issues in older age: whose incomes drop suddenly in retirement but whose rents remain the same (something which could become a bigger issue for generation rent in the future), but also older owners in unsatisfactory homes who cannot afford to upgrade their property or acquire somewhere suitable.

The AHC is keen to hear a range of views on how these problems of housing affordability can be ended and is hoping to bring together a small number of major policy initiatives which could make a dramatic difference. The AHC is keen to ensure that attention is focussed on the issues that matter most.

The AHC has produced a note providing more detail on the scope of the AHC’s research and further information on the Commission can be found on the  Affordable Housing Commission website.

The NHC has been invited to submit evidence to the AHC and we are keen to seek views, comments and evidence from members to inform our response.

The deadline for NHC to submit its views to the Commission is the 4th April 2019.

You can feed into the work of the Commission by

1. Attending the AHC/NHC event on 1^st March details here – to book please email events@northern-consortium.org.uk
2. Submitting your comments directly to the Commission via the Affordable Housing Commission website
3. Submitting your comments to the NHC to contribute towards our response on behalf of members – please submit comments by 22 March

If you have any queries or wish to submit your evidence, please email to Karen Brown, Senior Policy Advisor  karen.brown@northern-consortium.org.uk

Landlords have a legal requirement to ensure that a property is safe before letting it to a new tenant and local authorities have a statutory duty to keep the housing conditions in their area under review. It is now almost thirteen years since the introduction of the Housing Health and Safety Rating System (HHSRS). Introduced under the Housing Act 2004 and implemented in April 2006, it is the approach used to assess risks to health and safety in the home.

The rationale for its introduction was to standardise the way Environmental Health Practitioners (EHP) rated the risk to health and safety to occupants of dwellings and in doing so, replaced the more basic housing fitness standard assessment tool, introduced in the Housing Act 1985, which was based on whether the conditions in a property met a defined minimum level.

The new system was designed to be more comprehensive, and a range of different issues are now banded under a set of 29 categories which range from the more serious Category 1 and 2 where there is a serious danger to health and safety, through a range of other problems decreasing in severity such as design that might cause sprains and strains (Category 28). Some of the hazards include:

• Excess cold (because of increased heat loss)
• Fire (by allowing fire and smoke to spread to other parts of the dwelling)
• Lead (from old paint)
• Domestic hygiene, pests and refuse (by providing access and breeding places for pests, which are a source of infections), and
• Noise

MHCLG’s Local Authority Housing Statistics Data Return provides useful information on the presence of Category 1 hazards in each local authority area in England. The data for 2017/18 showed that out of a total of 2,676 local authority owned dwellings in England with a Category 1 hazard, only 49 could be found in the North.

The total estimated cost of removing the Category 1 hazards from these dwellings in the North amounts to £97,450 – an average of £1,989 per dwelling.

There was a total of 6,533 dwellings in the private rented sector which, following an inspection, were found to have one or more Category 1 hazards according to Local Authority Housing Statistics Data Return. In the absence of an estimated cost to remove hazards in the private sector, I have used the average cost for the local authority removal as a proxy to give an indication of costs. Using this £1,989 average above equates to an indicative cost of £12.9m to remove Category 1 hazards from private rented dwellings in the North.

Whilst tackling the most dangerous hazards is expensive, Cambridgeshire Insight carried out analysis that shows there are wider benefits to doing so. Taking one example, their analysis shows that tackling all instances of excess cold would cost some £6bn. However, this would result in savings of £848m per year to the NHS and would pay for itself in 7.14 years.

Despite the more stringent assessment system that the HHSRS introduced, a survey by the Chartered Institute of Environmental Health found that the vast majority of EHPs felt that the HHSRS should be updated. Subsequently, MHCLG has now commissioned a review to identify the extent to which the HHSRS needs to be updated and revised, including exploring the scope for setting minimum standards as part of the HHSRS framework.

The MHCLG project specification sets out to:

• Identify which parts of the HHSRS are out of date and need to be revised
• Demonstrate whether there would be scope for introducing a sampling and cloning approach – and where this approach might be appropriate
• Indicate whether the current penalties for non-compliance are appropriate and proportionate
• Show whether there is a need for additional worked examples in the guidance
• Help establish the feasibility of using digital technology to develop an app for the HHSRS, and
• Consider whether minimum standards should be included in the framework.

In 2017/18 the total number of private sector dwellings with Category 1 hazards which were made free from hazards as a direct result of action of local authorities was 5,559 in the North and 18,582 nationally. Whatever the outcome of the review and any subsequent change to legislation, it is clear that there is an ongoing battle for EHPs and NHC members to ensure that people are safe to live in their own homes.

In 2005 the World Health Organisation estimated that in the UK over 2.7 million people were injured at home, almost twice as many as those injured at work and over eight times those injured on the road. Consideration clearly needs to be given to wider health and safety issues in the home. But how are landlords and local authorities to determine what is a safe home in future?

Bookings are now being taken for the NHC’s 4^th Annual Health and Safety in Housing Conference which will be held in Leeds on 13^th June. Delegates will be given an update on the HHSRS from the Regulator and issues such as the implications of the Homes (Fitness for Human Habitation) Act 2019 will be discussed. We are running a session looking specifically at the legal aspects of the Homes (Fitness for Human Habitation) Act 2019 with our Supporter members Ward Hadaway on 7^th March – you can see more details here.