Examination of Witnesses (Questions 1-19)
MR MOHNI
GUJRAL, ARUN
MISRA, MR
CHARLIE ADAMS
AND MR
DAVID COWANS
15 MARCH 2004
Q1 Chairman: Good afternoon everyone
and welcome to the Committee, to our first session taking oral
evidence on the role and effectiveness of the Housing Corporation.
For the sake of our records would you all please identify yourselves.
Mr Gujral: My name is Mohni Gujral;
I am the Chief Executive of Presentation.
Mr Misra: I am Arun Misra, Director
of Corporate Services at Presentation.
Mr Adams: My name is Charlie Adams.
I am the Chief Executive of Hyde Housing Association, representing
two groups of housing associations, the CASE group and the G15.
Mr Cowans: My name is David Cowans
and I am the Chief Executive of the Places for People Group.
Chairman: Would any of you like to say
anything by way of introductory statement or would you like us
to go straight into questions? Fine, Chris Mole?
Q2 Chris Mole: The Government says it
is committed to securing sustainable communities. What do you
think the Housing Corporation's role is in achieving that?
Mr Cowans: I think the Corporation
has a role to play alongside very many other bodies. I suppose
this theme will come out quite a lot as we talk about the relationship
between the Housing Corporation and other bodies, regional, national
and local. Having some consensus about what a sustainable community
is, I suppose, the first point. I do not think there is any degree
of consensus about what these things look like and they have different
definitions depending on one's perspective. Fundamentally they
ought to be driven from an individual citizen's definition of
it. I define it as a place where the experience of living is good,
where I would live, where I would want to bring my kids upbasic
things like thatwhich then drives one into discussions
about the quality of schools, transport; not a traditional housing
agenda at all actually. My own view is that a lot of housing policy
has actually been driven by housing when housing is not the actual
problem. If you look at quite a lot of the housing market in renewal
areasbecause I guess we are one of the few organisations
that works actively in the north and the southit is the
future of these places as well as their housing histories that
have to be addressed. What is the point of particular towns any
more now that their economic infrastructure is weakened and all
those sorts of issues. The first point I would argue is to engage
in a debate and take quite a leading visionary role in that and,
secondly, to contribute to the delivery of some fundamental policy
drivers. One of the themes of what I will be saying is that I
think it is very seductive to talk about organisational formats,
but actually the real issue for me is to get some of the policies
right about what is it that we as a nation can do to deliver these
places that we would all live in, which are very well designed,
good quality, where there is good quality childcare, where there
are decent schools, where the transport infrastructure works and
all the rest of it. Having established that, then we should agree
the agencies to help deliver that and the role of the private
sector and all the rest of it. Secondly, to engage in the delivery
of some of those activities. To be fair, I think the Corporation
have made some progress recently about contributing to that
debate. Lastly for me the Housing Corporation's role is to drive
and manage the financing and grant programmes to help the delivery
of those, not just the affordable housing elements of those. I
think they need a wider role and to be fair I think they realise
that themselves and are starting to move on with that agenda.
Mr Gujral: I think it is important
for us to recognise that the Corporationas David has already
saidneeds to have a clear vision, a clear strategy to recognise
what sustainable communities are. However, I think it is also
about cohesive communities. We recognise that we need to have
cohesive communities and quite rightly they should be championing,
together with other organisations, that agenda. Without that championing
I think very little progress will be made and the Corporation,
I think, is very well placed to conduct that exercise. I think
it is absolutely essential that they fulfil that role.
Mr Adams: The CASE groupwhich
is one of the two groups that I representhas put forward
a particular submission about the role of the Corporation in relation
to sustainable communities. The first key point that the group
make is that there is a great deal of emphasis in the concept
of sustainable communities about designs (this often emanates
from government circles) but our view is that managementby
that we do not just mean housing management, but we mean management
of the community as a whole, the environment, the community facilities,
provision of community development services and other wider management
functionsis of critical importance if we are genuinely
to get a different sort of community to the ones which we have
attempted to create in the past. Central to that view is the need
to support and sustain agencies at a local level which are genuinely
neighbourhood agencies which represent local people to a degree
and have a control over some of the management services that I
have described. In our view there is no agency nationally that
does that currently. Certainly there is none within mainstream
government, yet the Housing Corporation when it was originally
set up back in 1974 had that specific remit and supported and
fostered a great number of housing associations that provided
services similar to that at a very local level. Even though over
the years that function has been reduced and dispensed with in
many ways, the bones of the structure for promoting and assisting
sustainable organisations to assist sustainable communities exists
within the Housing Corporation and our view is that it is the
right organisation to take over that responsibility.
Q3 Chris Mole: I think you have all,
at one stage or another, mentioned the need to have a vision for
social housing. Is it the Housing Corporation itself that has
failed to develop a vision or is that government has not specifically
tasked it to have a vision for social housing?
Mr Gujral: I think it is broader
than just a vision for social housing. I think what we are arguing
is that there should be a vision for the neighbourhood, the community;
simply to have a vision for social housing is not enough. We recognise
that housing is just one aspect of what we are doing in terms
of regenerating neighbourhoods and if we were to simply concentrate
on social housing then the issues that are affecting our communities
are not going to be dealt with. What we have to have is a comprehensive
programme of investment across the social and economic indices
to recognise that housing associations can actually be vehicles
for change in a much broader context. Our organisation, for example,
brands itself now as a social investment agency because we recognise
that simply providing housing is not going to tackle the issues
that our society and our communities are faced with. Therefore
we are developing initiatives and interventions that look at a
broad range of activities. For example, we have an organisation
that is looking specifically at the needs of black mental health
individuals. We have another organisation which is specifically
looking at empowering and building the capacity of organisations
on a neighbourhood level. I think the argument has to be that
it must be broader than social housing alone. As for whose responsibility
it is, I think it is the collective responsibility of the Corporation,
the sector and those policy makers who are involved in this area
to get together and ensure that we have a vision that we can collectively
buy into and that we can drive together.
Mr Cowans: There is nothing that
illustrates that more clearly than some of the examples of low
demand housing where it has become obviousif it was not
obvious alreadythat the intrinsic value of the property
is not the bricks and mortar and how nice it is and whether it
has central heating or nice windows; it is the impression one
has of living there. If that is a truism, then what Mohni has
just said also has to be a truism. We can no longer be in the
affordable housing game because that is not the fundamental determinate
of what makes the property and the place attractive. One of the
reasons we adopted our name was that we realised that we were
in a place-making game rather than just a house building game;
no longer would that be sufficient. As we went into it we started
to realise that people have more and more expressions of desire
about their place. For instance, people said to us, "I would
like to get a job but I can't any childcare" so we tried
the traditional routes of lobbying everywhere, could not get anywhere,
so we moved into the childcare business, not because we deliberately
wanted to but there was a massive need there that someone needed
to pick up. I think that is the sort of future that a lot of social
investment agenciescall them what you willwill eventually
do, so we will end up trying to get involved with local authorities
and all sorts of other agencies in making places and keeping places
the sort of place we all want to live in. That is really the change.
Mr Adams: The question was about
whether the Corporation has lost the vision and I think the answer
is that it has. It had a very clear and specific vision in the
1970's and that has gradually been reduced. The reason it has
been reduced is that effectively government has added functions
and responsibilities and taken away functions and responsibilities
and if the Corporation is to have a new vision it is government
that has to give it to it; it cannot really create it on its own.
Q4 David Clelland: Some of the submissions
we have had have suggested that the Government has burdened the
Housing Corporation with too many initiates. Is that your view
and, if so, what should the Corporation do about it?
Mr Gujral: Having worked for the
Corporation in a previous incarnation, I can certainly agree with
that view that there are many, many initiatives being developed
and sometimes that does take you away from the core of your activity
and the focus of your activity. Quite rightly, there are occasions
when the Corporation should be given additional responsibilities
but there also needs to be a recognition that if you are given
additional responsibilities then resources need to be matched.
That has not always been the case. I would say the answer to that
question is yes, it has been burdened with too many initiatives
and it needs to be looked at in a wider policy context in terms
of what other agencies are involved in the process of engagement,
what other agencies are involved in actually regenerating the
neighbourhoods that we are all interested in and what responsibilities
could be shared and developed together.
Q5 David Clelland: Presentation has said
in your submission that the Corporation is too focussed on outputs
without looking at the impact of its work in creating balanced
and cohesive communities. How should it change?
Mr Gujral: Absolutely right. I
think if you look back at all of the studies that have been done
over the past 40-odd years, study after study shows that there
has been too much of a concentration on the physical regeneration
and not enough concentration on the social and economic regeneration
of communities. There must be, at some time soon, a fundamental
shift of that balance because unless that happens we are not going
to be able to develop the kind of society that we are all aspiring
towards. I think urban renaissance over the last 40 or 50 years
has failed in terms of the poorest neighbourhoods that we are
involved in. That, in itself, is a testimony to the fact that
simply looking at outputs in the physical sense does not develop
the kind of society that you want to develop, nor does it develop
the people who live in those communities in the way that they
want to be developed and are quite capable of developing themselves.
What they need to be given is the capacity; they need to be given
the resources to be able to make decisions for themselves so that
they can determine what their future should be. I think that is
why we made the assertion in the submission; it has been far too
driven to outputs.
Q6 David Clelland: In terms of creating
better balance and cohesive communities, would you say that that
would be better achieved by the agencies on the ground having
more power rather than the Corporation itself doing it, or the
housing association or local authority regional boards? Would
that be a better approach?
Mr Gujral: Absolutely. I think
it has an enabling role; it has a role of being a catalyst in
developing agencies on the neighbourhood model that Charlie spoke
about earlier on. We are very strong advocates and proponents
of local neighbourhood agencies that are based on self-help because
through self-help we will actually realise our aspirations and
the communities will realise their aspirations. Therefore I think
the Corporation needs to acknowledge that and accept that that
is a fundamental aspect of the building blocks of successful sustainable,
cohesive communities.
Q7 What is the role of the Housing Corporation
going to be once the Regional Housing Boards are properly established?
Mr Adams: I will attempt to answer
that question, but it presupposes that I understand what the Housing
Boards are going to do and I am not entirely sure about that.
If I can take a historical perspective here about the role of
the Housing Corporation, I think the Corporation has given away
over the years a number of its core functions and I think that
has been to the detriment of the housing association movement.
Some of the reasons it has done that are as a result of government
initiative, but from time to time it has done it of its own accord
for a variety of reasons. Some local authorities have distinguished
track records in supporting housing associations and voluntary
agencies of one sort or another at a local level. However, unfortunately
not all local authorities are like that; they are inevitably subject
to change, they are subject to political change, financial change,
changes in policy and changes in fashion. All housing associations,
whether they are large ones or small ones, have experience of
suffering from local changes and as a result of which can be damaged
by processes over which they have no control. It seems to me therefore
that the Housing Corporation must continue to have an important
role which is the support of housing associations irrespective
of the changes which are occurring at a local level to ensure
that there is a degree of continuity. It seems to me that the
Housing Boards will have a strategic role in determining where
funding will be orientated. Having said that, in terms of fostering
and supporting local organisations, the Corporation has a very
important and continuing function irrespective of whether the
Boards expand their role or not.
Mr Cowans: I would support that,
but the other thing for me is, whatever one's view is about regional
agencies, there needs to be a role for someone to have an overview
of the whole housing market and to relay best practice between
regional agencies, otherwise one can inadvertently create ossification
as regions do not learn from each other. Hopefully that would
not happen, but it might. There is an important role for the Corporation
in that sense. There is also a major issue about the allocation
of resources between regions and how does that get dealt with?
Clearly everyoneincluding mewould argue for a particular
regional position to the exclusion of other regions. That is entirely
right; that is the basis of regionalism. But who handles the national
allocation of resources issue? The third big area for me is that
there is just a possibility that without some sort of national
agency that tension and debate about where one goes, where the
future is, what the new approaches might be, might not be as robust
as it could be. I think those sorts of relationships are the ones
I would see developing in a vision that might just be in my mind
about how Regional Housing Boards might develop. The last thing
for me is that any regional agency can do with a bit of support
now and again. It perhaps is not as strong as it ought to be;
it perhaps needs some help with staffing or ideas or resources
sometimes and if one has a role for the Housing Corporation in
that regard as well, it might then actually have a very powerful
and needed role to help Regional Housing Boards develop to their
potential.
Q8 Chris Mole: We have touched on the
importance in a social and economic context that housing sits
in, so how can affordable housing strategies be better aligned
to the needs of local and sub-regional economies? Or is that what
the Regional Boards will be doing?
Mr Gujral: That is one of the
very strong aspects of their work. Clearly the relationship between
the Regional Housing Boards and the Corporation do need to be
very closely aligned to the sub-regional agenda. There is no doubt
about that. I think we are all very supportive of the idea of
a sub-regional approach. We recognise the moving market; we understand
the economy and the way it works and how it impacts on local neighbourhoods
so from our perspective we would very much welcome that and think
that the engagement between the Regional Housing Boards together
with the Corporation is a critical aspect of the success of the
future because if they do not dovetail and do not align their
respective strategies, then we certainly are not going to be able
to achieve what we were talking about in your introductory comments.
Q9 Andrew Bennett: It is the Places for
People evidence that really deals with the low demand areas. Are
housing associations in low demand areas going to have to face
having some of their stock knocked down?
Mr Cowans: I think some of them
already have. Certainly we have. There is a fundamental issue
which comes back to the last question about the ability of all
the agencies to understand very volatile housing markets; they
are developing very fast. Development programmes necessarily take
a while so by the time you construct something in a place that
looked like it had quite a lot of demand, it has not got any any
more. There have been quite a few examples of that, about one
tries to anticipate very volatile and rapid changes. The worst
example I have seen of thatalthough there are plenty of
examples up and down the countryis in the west end of Newcastle
where demand virtually collapsed and an area that maybe 15 years
ago was quite a bustling community, is largely boarded up now
and it has become a bit of a laboratory for the impact of low
demand on whole neighbourhoods. I think yes, they have to; some
of them already have. In our submission we talk about the need
for housing associations at the local level to actually bite the
bullet and put some of their stuff together into joint venture
vehicles in order to make a much more neighbourhood-wide impression,
rather than a specific to their stock impression. That is not
to say that they should not do that, but often the problems are
so big that if they are not tackled collectively we would argue
that they will not be as effective as they could be.
Q10 Andrew Bennett: Before we move onto
the collective activity, does it mean that some housing associations
are going to go bust if they move the rent income from allotted
properties?
Mr Cowans: I do not know, to be
honest. I think there are issues about how people deal with the
loss of stock. I think there are issues about the depreciation
of social housing grant that could positively help in that regard.
because it is the only part of a housing association balance sheet
that does not depreciate so that would contribute. There is a
major issue for us in our submission about what sort of new tools
are in place to help the replacement of these particular neighbourhoods,
not least in the context of communities who have lived there for
a long time and actually quite a lot of them like living there,
and how one deals with their expectations and their views about
the community, how one handles the clearance process. There is
a whole set of issues.
Q11 Is it the job then of the Pathfinder
schemes to do it or is it the job of the Housing Corporation to
be a bit more proactive in this area?
Mr Cowans: I would argue both.
I think the Corporation has a role in working with all of the
Pathfinders to try to find best practice and develop new policy
tools. It also has a responsibility to listen to the experience
of housing market Pathfinders who are often dealing with the most
difficult and problematic areas and often have some extremely
tough choices to make, and also of working with local people and
taking them through what is a very difficult change process (there
is no doubt about that, I have personal experience of doing that).
So there is a role for both, adopting slightly different roles
and hopefully we will get the sort of synergy that could make
a real difference.
Q12 Andrew Bennett: Fragmentation of
stock is the issue you point to. Surely that is an advantage to
the tenant. You can get evicted by about six different housing
associations before you come to the end of the market.
Mr Cowans: Or six different local
authorities. That is a real difficulty in any environment because
housing markets do not end at the local authority boundary, as
we now obviously agree.
Q13 Andrew Bennett: You are arguing strongly
that there should be a much more limited market.
Mr Cowans: That is my view. I
think it would be sensible and is probably the way forward for
agencies at the local level to band together in order to have
the strength to tackle what are massive problems.
Q14 Andrew Bennett: Are you talking about
the Housing Corporation facilitating merges of associations or
are you talking about stock transfers between associations?
Mr Cowans: Our experience of stock
transfers is that they are really complicated to deal with. They
are labyrinthine. There are also sorts of issues about the existing
debt on properties, there are legal charges for the transfer.
There is a whole minefield of difficulties. Our viewand
it is a thing we have been talking about for a while nowis
the creation of joint venture vehicles where individual associations
who operate in a particular area might put their stock togetherthey
do not necessarily have to cede ownership of it because to do
so requires all of these transaction costs to make that workin
order to create new neighbourhood agencies. To date nothing like
that has been established but it is something we are very interested
in looking at with some local partners to see if we can get it
to work.
Q15 Andrew Bennett: You get this new
management group with properties that belong to different people,
if you then want to knock half a dozen down you have to look back
to see who owns them.
Mr Cowans: You have got to do
that. All I am saying is that the traditional routes of transferring
stock is too complicated.
Q16 Andrew Bennett: Why not simplify
that?
Mr Cowans: I think the Corporation
has got a role. I think they are starting to address this in terms
of advising Housing Market Renewal Pathfinders about how they
might gather together housing associations.
Q17 Andrew Bennett: Do you think the
Housing Corporation has been active in that? My impression is
that they are sort of tagging on behind.
Mr Cowans: To be fair, there is
more activity in some Pathfinders than others.
Q18 Andrew Bennett: What about more activity
from the Housing Corporation?
Mr Cowans: From everybody, to
be honest.
Q19 Andrew Bennett: I accept that, but
I am interested in the Housing Corporation's role.
Mr Cowans: I think the Housing
Corporation are working in some places.
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