Housing Repairs Insourcing Project: Stakeholder Engagement Workstream
Tenant and Leaseholder Advisory Group
18th March 2016
Notes / Action /In attendance: Vicky Kennedy (VK) (Chair & notes), Iain Allott (IA), Jill Hurst (JH), Lindsey Hill (LH), Terry Bawden (TB), Christine Commander (CC), Mick Daniels (MD), Margaret Hill (MH), Paula McCartney (PM), John Kite (JK), Marie Oxley (MO)
Apologies: Joan Johnson
1. Welcome and introductions
VK welcomed the Group and thanked them for attending. Introductions were done for Lindsey, who was attending for item 4 (Performance Monitoring).
MD raised concerns about the previous meeting being cancelled at short notice – VK, JH and IA apologised and explained the reasons for this, and that this will only ever happen if unavoidable.
MD also raised concerns about the length of time taken to answer his query to Mark Betts re vehicles. Officers explained info can sometimes take a while to collate – VK to circulate the paper which Mark provided to all Group members with the next set of minutes.
Also agreed that Mark will attend a future meeting of this group to provide an update on the Transport Workstream.
Also agreed that ‘Branding’ needs to be topic for a future agenda.
2. Project update
Iain gave a brief update on the project, as per the ‘Project Dashboard’ circulated to members of the Group.
3. Workstream Focus – Housing Readiness
Jill Hurst, Workstream Lead for Housing Readiness, gave a presentation on this item (as per the paper circulated in advance to the Group). Her presentation covered the following areas:
· Purpose / objectives of the Workstream
· Who is involved
· Performance Monitoring (covered in more detail in item 4, below)
Main queries / points of discussion were:
· Why so many ‘overdue’ repairs jobs? Jill and Lindsey explained that some are simply not ‘closed’ on the system, even though they have been completed, and others are more complex issues / jobs (eg. jobs requiring complicated scaffolding) which will always take longer.
· Formal consultation with leaseholders – Jill explained that this is not required, but this needs to be explained properly to leaseholders, along with ‘softer’ non-formal consultation with them, which will be factored into the Communications Plan for the project.
· Concerns around the HRA ring-fence, and that HRA may be used to pay for corporate repairs contract work. Jill explained that this will not happen, and that safeguards are in place within the Council’s finance system to prevent this from happening.
· Out-of-hours contract – currently this is based in South Tyneside, but Jill advised that these arrangements need to be looked at. The Council may prefer to have its own out-of-hours service, but for Day One we may keep the current arrangements. This to be a future agenda item.
4. Performance Monitoring
Lindsey presented this item (copy of presentation provided at meeting, and to be circulated with the minutes).
She and Jill explained that we need the Group to feedback on the current KPIs:
· which are still valid
· which are less important to customers,
· what do we need to focus on going forward, are there gaps ?
Initial feedback from the Group included the fact that some people don’t really know why they attend certain meetings (eg. Action Planning Groups (APGs)), or what their purpose is.
JH asked the Group to consider whether should tenants be involved more directly in conducting satisfaction surveys ? Would this help prompt more honest responses?
Jill advised that the KPI’s agreed by the Group would form the basis of the “contract” with the new service. There was a commitment also to still involve tenants in the scrutiny of the service but we need to shape this engagement over the next few months through the Group.
Jill asked for feedback at the next meeting on the KPI’s we should go forward with.
5. Any other business
The Group agreed that these meetings should be extended by half-an-hour as we always seem to run out of time (Vicky to also be less ambitious with the agendas!).
Vicky thanked everyone for their attendance and the meeting closed. / VK
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JH / VK
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Group Members
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VK
Dates of future meetings:
· Friday 22 April, 10:00-12:00, Committee Room 2, Town Hall
· Friday 20 May, 10:00-12:00, Room G42, Town Hall
· Friday 17 June, 10:00-12:00, Room G42, Town Hall
· Friday 15 July, 10:00-12:00, Room G42, Town Hall
· Friday 19 August, 10:00-12:00, Room G42, Town Hall
· Friday 16 September, 10:00-12:00, Room G42, Town Hall
· Friday 21 October, 10:00-12:00, Room G42, Town Hall
· Friday 18 November, 10:00-12:00, Room G42, Town Hall
· Friday 16 December, 10:00-12:00, Room G42, Town Hall
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G:\NBH\FoCH\Phase 3 Future of Council Housing\Repairs Insourcing Project\Consultation\TLAG\Mar16 Meeting\TLAG Minutes Mar16.docx