Tour of West Yorkshire with DLUHC officials

Last month, the NHC hosted a visit to West Yorkshire with officials from the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC). Emran Mian, Director General for Regeneration at the department, and Josh Goodman, Director of Social Housing, travelled from London to visit a number of our members’ sites across the region. The tour took place over two days. Thank you to NHC Supporter member Ward Hadaway for supporting the visit.

The context of the tour was around the issues and solutions associated with three key priorities for the social housing sector: building safety and quality; new supply; and net zero.

In the aftermath of the Grenfell Tower tragedy, there has been a need to invest in remediation and compliance and with a new Decent Homes Standard emerging, there is significant investment required in building safety and quality.

In terms of supply, the North has a persistent shortfall in the development of new affordable homes. Over 5 years, average annual affordable housing delivery across the North has fallen 45% short of the independently-assessed need.

On net zero, IPPR North analysis for the NHC estimated the cost of retrofitting and decarbonising the heating of the North’s 1.3m social homes at £23bn. The average SAP score for social housing in the North is SAP69 (a very low EPC C) suggesting that even if work was limited to retrofit, works would still be required in over 650,000 homes by 2030.

The tour began on the Thursday with a visit to two Leeds & Yorkshire Housing Association (LYHA) sites, with LYHA’s Mark Pearson (Chief Executive) and Joanna Chambers (Director of Assets and Growth) highlighting potential retrofit through government funding and new supply through Section 106. The first site was St. Mary’s Court in the Chapeltown area of Leeds, a 1970s built estate with three-storey blocks of flats. This site was subject to a bid for Wave 2 of the Social Housing Decarbonisation Fund (SHDF), worked on within the West Yorkshire Combined Authority (WYCA) consortium, and will hope to receive funding to complete retrofit works such as new heating systems and upgraded fabric.

Approximately 50% of LYHA’s growth is delivered through section 106 opportunities and this was showcased with a visit to Boggart Hill Gardens in Seacroft, to see homes delivered for both social rent and shared ownership. These homes were delivered through a S106 agreement between developer Strata and the council and have had strong demand.

The tour then moved on to two Leeds City Council (LCC) sites, with details provided by Paul Rounding (Capital Programme Manager, Leeds City Council). The first site was The Barncrofts, a number of high-rise housing blocks in the northeast of Leeds. The Barncrofts are one of six District Heating Clusters across the city which will provide renewable heat to be used for heating and hot water purposes. This scheme involves replacing the existing electric storage heating and hot water systems in 26 high rise housing blocks with modern and efficient heating, reducing carbon emissions. As part of the visit, attendees were able to speak to a tenant who has benefited greatly from the retrofit and can now heat the entire flat for longer and for cheaper.

The next LCC site was Roxby Close, another high-rise building in the Lincoln Green area of Leeds – a designated priority area for fuel poverty and unemployment. This scheme was created to address concrete works that need attention, as well as provide energy performance benefits to residents through installation of external wall insulation.

That evening, Ward Hadaway hosted a dinner at their Leeds offices, attended by housing association chief executives and local authority housing leads. The dinner gave our members the opportunity to discuss with DLUHC officials the key priorities for their organisations, tenants, and the sector. The discussion was focused on key issues for the sector such as the rent cap, decarbonisation, new supply and building quality.

On the Friday morning, we were joined by Naz Parkar (Director of Homes and Neighbourhoods, Kirklees Council) who took us to Abbey Road, located in the Ashbrow ward, an area with the highest levels of fuel poverty and carbon emissions within Kirklees. The scheme has raised the profile of retrofit and the needs of communities in the North with visits from the WYCA Metro Mayor Tracy Brabin and Sir Keir Starmer, who was “really impressed” and after speaking with tenants who said energy bills had plummeted. These homes had been retrofitted with various measures including external wall insultation, heat pumps and PV panels.

Naz Parkar then took us to Huddersfield town centre to visit Buxton House, a high-rise block that sits on top of an existing three-story commercial development. Kirklees Council are working on plans for the remodelling of the Buxton House block, which will require tenants to be decanted and will result in the provision of one and two bedroom flats, major fire safety improvements and the introduction of a new, more welcoming, entrance – with an estimated scheme cost of £16 million.

After visiting Kirklees sites we returned to Leeds where we convened at Yorkshire Housing’s new sustainable office, ‘The Place’ for a working lunch with a presentation from Helen Lennon (Chief Executive, Connect) and Nick Atkin (Chief Executive, Yorkshire Housing) who are also Chair and Vice Chair respectively of the West Yorkshire Housing Partnership. Helen and Nick provided an update for Emran Mian on the key priorities facing the regions housing sector and asks from DLUHC to help deal with these. We also had a presentation from Chris Thompson and Jonathan Wilson from Citu, the developers of the Climate Innovation District on which ‘The Place’ lies.

After lunch, Guinness Partnership hosted us at their new Points Cross site, one of the largest developments in Guinness’s 130-year history. Points Cross is located near Leeds Docks and the Royal Armouries Museum in the South Bank Regeneration Area. It has planning approval for 928 high-quality, energy efficient homes. This visit highlighted the positive effect that new supply can have on regenerating areas and the potential for high-quality new supply of affordable homes in the North.

The NHC would like to give a huge thank you to all members involved in this DLUHC visit for helping to relay the key messages for the sector to high-level civil service officials – Leeds & Yorkshire Housing Association; Leeds City Council; Kirklees Council; Yorkshire Housing; Guinness Partnership; West Yorkshire Combined Authority; and also to the West Yorkshire Housing Partnership and Citu for their presentations. We’d also like to thank all those in attendance at the dinner for contributing to a great discussion and give thanks to our supporter member Ward Hadaway for hosting the dinner at their Leeds offices.