GovWire

The government will name and shame failing social housing providers as part of major reforms to give residents a stronger voice and drive up standards.

Todays move means social landlords providing sub-standard housing and services would be publicly called out on the governments website and across social media channels.

Measures announced today (29 March 2022) also include a Resident Panel that will allow tenants who live in social housing to be heard directly by government. Around 250 social tenants from across England will be invited to share their experiences and help us ensure our reforms work to drive up standards.

As set out in the Social Housing White Paper, our reforms - due to be delivered through legislation - will transform the experiences of residents, with a major reform of the way in which social landlords are regulated and held to account for the homes and services they deliver.

The government has already set out a wide range of measures designed to drive up standards and fix a broken complaints system including by strengthening regulation of the sector, improving the Housing Ombudsman Service, and empowering residents to?know and?exercise their rights.

A package of measures announced today goes even further. It includes:

• Publicising on social media where landlords have breached the Regulators consumer standards or where the Housing Ombudsman has made its most serious finding - severe maladministration - against them.
• The launch of a Resident Panel, inviting residents to have their say on how to improve the quality of social housing. The Panel will allow residents to scrutinise and influence measures to strengthen the Decent Homes Standard, training and qualification for staff, a new Access to Information Scheme and other planned reforms.
• Publishing draft clauses to legislation that will reform the regulation of social housing through tougher consumer powers, greater enforcement tools to tackle failing landlords and new responsibilities on social landlords.
• A new factsheet explaining the role of the Regulator of Social Housing and Housing Ombudsman Service.
• A single gov.uk page, setting out our progress on implementing the measures in the Social Housing White Paper and further measures being introduced to improve quality of social housing.

Todays announcement follows the governments campaign to help people secure improvements to their living conditions.

The governments Make Things Right campaign helps residents raise complaints if they are unhappy with their landlords services and struggling to get problems resolved, with clear advice on how to progress issues?to the?Housing Ombudsman if necessary. Adverts have run on digital and social media channels, as well as music streaming sites, to raise awareness of the complaints process and barriers to these being progressed.

Further information

Any social housing resident can submit an application to join the Panel, which will close on Friday 29 April.

The new panel will be a way for tenants across the country to get involved in our work to drive up social housing quality.

The Resident Panel will be supported by a national survey. Around 5,000 residents will be asked to share their views about their landlords services during March and April 2022. The survey will be used to monitor the impact our reforms will have on social housing residents.

We will publish on social media where landlords have breached the Regulators consumer standards or where the Housing Ombudsman Service has made its most serious finding - severe maladministration - against them. See the latest findings from the Housing Ombudsman Service.

The Housing Ombudsman is focused on helping to resolve individual complaints made by tenants, shared owners and leaseholders about their landlords. They can consider complaints and disputes and may help mediate to find a resolution. The Regulator of Social Housing is focused on ensuring that the landlord meets the standards set for social housing providers. This includes that the landlord is well-managed and financially viable, provides tenants with quality accommodation, choice and protection, and that its tenants can hold their landlords to account. Read a factsheet on the Housing Ombudsman, and Regulator of Social Housing.