Fuel Poverty

In the UK we have nearly 5 million households of the 25  million UK homes in fuel poverty.

In Southwark we have 10,139 or 9.2% of our 109,674 homes in fuel poverty.

In Dulwich and West Norwood we have 4,627 or 11.1% of the 41,748 homes in fuel poverty.

This is clearly too many. The governments Green Deal is meant to deal with this. It effectively enables people to borrow money for insulation etc to reduce their bills against the savings they’ll make.

But I still think we have a big gap where basic loft and cavity wall insulation needs to be made free for everyone. Many don’t have the skills to jump through the hoops required if they’re already entitled. Others just don’t need to individually. But nationally we need to reduce our dependence upon fuel imports and the national security issues it creates.

Does you loft need insulating – what’s stopping you?

 

 

 

Designated Person – Use Me…

From 1 April the Localism Act of 2011 made me and all other councillors, MPs and tenant panels “designated person”

This means we can refer problems social tenants experience to the Housing Ombudsman. Previously  the  Housing Ombudsman would only consider complaints after te housing providers complaints procedures have been exhausted – often and exhausting process – and within 6 months.

This is particularly good news for housing association tenants. Previously councillors really felt disarmed when presented with terrible problems with housing associations properties.

At last we can help in such cases.

if you have a social housing problem do use your local councillors. We now have more powers to try and help.

Southwark Housing Sell Off?

20130426 SLP - Dulwich CC & housing commission This week at the Dulwich Community Council the  Labour led Southwark Council had officers asking residents if they agreed with the council selling off council housing or having it transferred out of council ownership.

They asked whether it should be run by an Arms Length Management Organisation (ALMO). As the Labour cabinet member stated “We’ve taken the bull by the horns and are asking the questions that many have avoided, about how councils can continue to deliver good social housing to those in need despite funding cuts and changing demographics”.

But at the last local elections when the Lib Dems predicted that Labour would propose this they said we were wrong and lying. I doubt we’ll ever get an apology.

At the meeting many residents were enraged with such questions and abstained from responding to the loaded directive questions. It was embarassing to see a council official have to present something that they confirmed all the senior managers and cabinet councillors had signed-off.

What do you think should be the future of Southwark Council housing?

 

 

Dodgy Letterboxes

I’m perplexed to see that new fire resitant front doors have been  installed with very low letterboxes e.g. Friern Road blocks 100 flats. GReat that theyre getting more fire safe front doors but if they’re messed up on part them have they messed up anything else.

I know from the Communication Workers Union (CWU) campaigns (I’m an ex.member) that they recommend letterboxes adhere to the British Standard and European Standard (EN13724) based on it. This is due to over 3,000 postal workers suffering injuries a year from low letterboxes. Indeed NHBC also recommend this.

As a CWU official and the cabinet member for housing I’m amazed Cllr Ian Wingfield has not ensured council officers are aware of these standards and ensure they’re followed?

The particular East Dulwich iteration of this problem is Friern Road blocks where they’ve all been install 500mm high but the recommended height is 700mm-1700mm high for individual letterboxes. This doesn’t sound important until you think of a postie day in day out having to deliver to such dodgy letterboxes. With 40,000 tenanted and 12,000 leasehold properties eventually that’s an awful lot of back ache that will be created.

Come on Ian please do both your jobs properly.

Council Rents

Council tenants in Southwark would see their rent CUT under new plans put forward by Liberal Democrats.

We put forward proposals to reduce council rents by 1% in all council-owned homes in the borough, in contrast to the 4.85% increase being added by the Labour administration – a saving of £285 per year for the average council tenant.

Why? because for a number of years the last Labour government made local councils increase rents. If they didn’t they were penalised. The coalition government has stopped tihs coercion.

So the Lib Dem group have worked up the proposals using spare cash from the Housing Revenue Account (HRA), which makes an annual surplus of more than £7m because the amount of rent collected is higher than the money being paid out for upkeep of homes. We say that the extra money that has been collected from tenants should be given back in the form of a one-off rent cut.

The HRA is a separate budget from the general ‘Revenue Account’ of the council and can only be used for housing-related spending rather than general services. Councils were previously obliged to increase rents in line with a government formula, but rule changes brought in by the Coalition mean councils now have power to set their own rent levels without facing financial penalties.

Labour’s 4.85% rent increase will add £231.92 to the annual rent bill for the average council property (£4.46 per week), set to begin on 1 April. The Lib Dems’ 1% cut would reduce rents by £47.84 per year, saving the average tenant £285 in 2013/14 compared to Labour plans.

The rent cut policy comes on the back of income tax cuts to low income households pushed through by Lib Dem ministers in government, which will see the basic income tax threshold rise to £10,000 in this Parliament, saving many households up to £700.

Our leader Cllr Anood Al-Samerai said:

“The Lib Dems know that many people are finding it tough at the moment, which is why we want to put money back into the pockets of those who need it most.”

“Rather than imposing an increase in council rents, we would actually cut rents to give people a helping hand. Along with the income tax changes brought in nationally by Lib Dems in government, our rent cut would be a welcome boost for residents throughout Southwark.”

“We will be putting this proposal to full Council Assembly and asking Labour councillors to back it. It will be interesting to see if they vote to cut rents to save people money, or if they stick to the party line of increasing rents by almost 5% when they know people are suffering financially.”

 

Housing War Chest

 Southwark Labour have been charging more rent than they need. They’ve stated away £6.5M into a war chest. They’re now deciding how to spend this money in the last full financial year before the next local election.

This money should either not have been charged to generally our poorest residents OR it should have been used to make improvements before.

But we do have local housing issues that can be brought forward.

We’ve suggested our priorities for East Dulwich council properties are:
1. Safety issues such as electric wiring
2. Security – tenanted properties are the target of burglary and tenants are the least likely to be able to afford contents insurance – solid secure front and back doors, excellent two locks on each entrance door – Banham quality, Manchester and London bars on all doors, doors have bolts into frame, good windows locks.
3. Loft insulation – much done but we need to ensure all properties have the maximum possible.
4. Cavity wall insulation – ensure all done and well – removing debris from cavity before installing.
5. Modern double or better triple glazing – most of our external decoration need on council street properties is around ancient sash windows. So apart from reducing energy poverty this solves much of the decoration regime that has never existed. It can also make the homes more secure if done well. Such glazing should match the buildings age so sash double or triple glazing for Victorian street properties for example. Triple rather than double due to the extra energy savings.
6. External decoration.

The administration has also suggested replacing Halliwell Court entry phone. It isn’t a great system but no worse than others. The issue is the ground floor flats. So we’ve separately asked for clear signs of how to reach them by walking a short distance around the block. A nice simple cheap solution.

What do you think the council housing in East Dulwich needs most?

Welfare Reform – cap and spare bedrooms.

Welfare reform will always be painful. With the current generally harsher economic circumstances our societies tolerance for others on benefits has reduced.

One of the proposals is that no family claiming benefits will be able to claim more than the average family income for the country – £25,000 pa.

In East Dulwich this will impact 11 families claiming benefits. Each of these families are predicted to lose on average £3,887. If you’re one of those families please do get in touch if you need extra help or support.

Another aspect of welfare reform is around council houses where the occupants claim housing benefits (where the government pays the rent) and have spare bedrooms. They’ll see a reduction in housing benefit. The idea is that while we have families in bed and breakfast without proper homes we shouldn’t be fully subsidising under occupation of council housing. Their will be circumstance where this feels harsh but it must feel even harsher trying to raise families in bed and breakfast accommodation for long periods of time.

In East Dulwich this is predicted to affect 91 homes where 1 bedroom is spare and the tenants claim housing benefit and another 43 homes where 2 or more bedrooms are spare and the tenants claim housing benefit. Some years ago when the Lib Dems led the council we had schemes to encourage such occupiers to move to smaller council homes. Hopefully this scheme will become more popular to smooth people moving to smaller homes where appropriate.

If these changes affect you and you think you need those spare bedrooms please get in touch so we can try and help you fight for a sensible solution. It might be due to home dialysis, a son or daughter being in the armed forces. Whatever it is we want to try and help.

 

 

Travellers Rights Expand

Southwark Council provides four travelers sites. Sadly not enough traveller sites exist across England.

Labour Southwark has decided to increase the rights of travellers for pitches at those sites. First they’re guaranteeing that fees will never rise by more than inflation. So in real terms the fees will go down with time. It also means the fees are unlikely to cover the costs of providing these sites long-term maintenance. They’ve also decided to give infinite successor rights. Child of the children of the children, etc, etc, etc of current travellers to live on a specific Southwark pitch for ever.

Weirdly this is the interpretation of part of the 2008 Housing Act that the last Labour government introduced with provisions coming into affect April 2011. Even in that act it only states succession not limited to one. So Southwark Labour could have stated two which would be amazingly generous not being based on need. For council housing successor rights are limited to one. I don’t understand why mainstream council housing tenants have fewer rights than traveller pitches which are another form of social housing.

Fortunately the decision has been called in to the Overview and Scrutiny Committee by Lib Dem members.

Heathrow nonsense

I was dismayed to see such stupid protestations from Conservative MP’s  who should know better and supposed business leaders. They’ve been demanding Heathrow have a third runway to magically solve all our economic woes.

First myth. Building a third runway with all the infrastructure would take at least 10 years and would only come on stream in two or three five year parliaments time. Not much economic magic about a ten plus year delay.

Second myth. That air pollution wouldn’t be a problem, that aircraft are so much cleaner. Most aircraft are flown for 40+ years. The current aircraft flying would be the ones to be used. Equally ground transport for passengers and staff would see NOx pollution causing further ill health to residents there let alone all the noise pollution. The World Health Organisation noise limits are already well and truly being breached across London.

What is truly astounding is the latest MP to call for this is Tim Yeo. He’s the chair of the parliamentary Climate Change select committee. Clearly a man in the wrong job.

The coalition agreement is quite clear. No third runway at Heathrow. I’d be saddened if the Conservatives renege on their commitment to this going into the 2015 elections. The Heathrow sound problem reaches across most of south London.

2,000 illegal sub letting

Southwark Council has 19,000 people on its housing waiting list.

At the start of the year I asked Southwark Council internal audit management whether could use commercial data matchers to fight fraud. So I’m delighted this technique originally brought to work on illegal claims for Council Tax Single Persons Discount is now being applied to council properties and the housing waiting list. Initially 2,000 properties out of the 45,000 have been highlighted as being good leads for further investigation. Of the 2,000, 900 have really good data matches. So many matches that a new team has been created to chase them all up. The council isn’t yet clear how many on the council housing waiting list shouldn’t be. But we can expect a large reduction.

The technique uses commercial credit agencies databases and finds examples such as a tenant who is supposed to be living in Southwark but who bank statements go elsewhere, individuals with a history of fraud and similar data matching. The data matching will also work with other boroughs cross-checking details against what is held elsewhere.

2,000 recovered homes would mean around 5,200 desperate people on the housing waiting list being found a property. And 2,000 property matches the estimated 5% across London of illegally sub-let council housing. So its likely to be 2,000 and not 900. Last year Southwark officers thought they were doing really well in recovering 150 such properties so quite an uphill struggle to deliver those 2,000 quickly.

This is such a good technique that Southwark Liberal Democrat have written to all housing associations with properties in Southwark to ask when they will use this method. It may well reveal more opportunities to legally house people.

Where else could we use this technique – school place admissions. I’ve often had people querying whether all the families obtaining places are genuinely living close to a school. It’s already being applied to Council Tax Single Persons Discounts.

Do you have any ideas?