Beyond Decent Homes - Communities and Local Government Committee Contents


Examination of Witnesses (Question Number 39)

MR NIGEL LONG, MR MICHAEL GELLING OBE AND MS TRISH CANHAM

26 OCTOBER 2009

  Q39 Chair: Same rules as before, do not feel obliged for each of you to answer every question, otherwise we will never cover the ground, and it is up to you to kind of volunteer, but if I think somebody is hogging it, I will obviously intervene. The first question really is about whether, from your point of view, you think that tenants are being kept informed about and involved in plans to manage the Decent Homes backlog after 2010.

  Mr Gelling: I would just like to say, in opening, Decent Homes has been a great success for promoting tenants' involvement and engagement, and Decent Homes has triggered ALMOs to improve management. Some of the most successful ALMOs are tenant led, for example Cora Carter, my secretary at Kirklees; Alf Chandler, the previous chair of TAROE from Hounslow Homes; and Juliet Rawlings, of course, from Kensington and Chelsea TMO, the best formal tenant management organisation that there has been in this country, in my opinion, but that is just me. All have improved their services and management, most have extended the Decent Homes programme to encompass worklessness, for example Nottingham City Homes, chaired by Janet Storar, a tenant, has a programme of One in a Million, so for every million pounds that is invested into a contractor, a trainee apprentice has to be taken on and employed. Currently, there are 200 new apprenticeships, so far 40 have been taken on, covering plumbing, plastering and electrics, joinery et cetera.



 
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