Have your say on our Common housing Allocations Policy – sessions across Angus

We would like your views on our draft Angus Common Allocation Policy.  The feedback you provide will help us finalise the policy. We are holding sessions across Angus in the coming weeks to allow you to share your views with us.

If you would like to attend any of the following sessions, or if you are unable to attend but would like us to contact you by email, please let us know by emailing TenantParticipation@angus.gov.uk.

Friday 24^th May – Cricket Café, Strathmore Cricket Club, Forfar 10 – 12

Tuesday 28^th May – Well Bean Café, East and Old Parish Church, Forfar 12:30 – 2PM

Tuesday 28^th May – Adult Room, Forfar Community Campus 6:15 – 7:45PM

Wednesday 29^th May – Well Bean Café, Café Project, Arbroath 12:30 – 2PM

Wednesday 29^th May – Mo Hub, Murray Street, Montrose 6:15 – 7:45PM

Wednesday 29^th May – Carnoustie Library, High Street, Carnoustie 10am – 12pm

Thursday 30^th May – Well Bean Café, Mo Hub, Murray Street, Montrose 12:30 – 2PM

Thursday 30^th May – Bruce House, Wellgate, Arbroath 6:15 – 7:45PM

Friday 31^st May – Community Café, The Crickety, Caldhame Place, Brechin 10 – 12

Wednesday 5^th June – Monifieth Library, High Street, Monifieth 2-4pm

We have pulled together the main changes as a summary and the full draft is also available. We would like you to take part in a short survey on whether or not you agree with these new changes.

Get involved with the Housing Service – additional sessions

We’ve added two more dates for the Customer Charter and Service Standards tenant engagement sessions

Thursday 16^th May – 1-3pm in Monifieth Library

Friday 17^th May– 10-11.30am within Carnoustie Library

Please come along for one of the sessions and give us your view on improving housing services.

How We Did Last Year -Charter Report Card

Each year we provide a wide range of information about Housing performance to the Scottish Housing Regulator for the Scottish Social Housing Charter.

We have prepared our latest Charter Report Card working in partnership with our Tenants Steering Group, and the information is grouped into the areas which are contained in the Charter. This year we have been unable to consult with our tenant representatives in person, but they have contributed digitally to the design of our report card, and we thank them for their involvement.

The Report Card is available online and shows what performance our tenants think is most important.

We haven’t included details on all the Charter outcomes and indicators but you can find these on the Scottish Housing Regulator’s website

Rent Increase. Have your say!*

Are you an Angus Council tenant?

If so, we need your views on the proposed rent increase for 2021/22 and options on how your rent money will be spent.

All three options would keep your rent amongst the lowest in Scotland.

Why are we proposing to increase the rent?

We need to make sure the money we receive from rent is enough to pay for existing services, including repairs, but also to pay for larger improvements needed for tenants’ homes and to help build new homes.

Rent increases allow us to invest in our homes to continue to meet the Scottish Housing Quality Standard. Rent increases will also allow us to meet the Energy Efficiency Standard for Social Housing.

The rent rise is partly based on the inflation measure of CPI (Consumer Price Index), and in recent years an additional set percentage of 1% had been agreed between us and the Tenant Rent Setting Group. CPI+1% is the minimum rent increase required to allow us to deliver our current plans and manage inflationary rises. We need to increase the rent at least by inflation because that’s what it costs us to deliver existing services. However, following feedback received last year we have considered some alternative options with input from the Tenant Rent Setting Group.

How we decide on the Increase

We’re carrying out a consultation to help tenants consider the rent increase options and clearly see how the rent money will be spent.

The results of this survey will be presented at the Communities Committee in February 2021, where the final decision on a rent increase for 2021/22 will be made.

Rent Increase – the options

The Tenant Rent Setting Group has agreed three options which the members feel will bring benefits to tenants while keeping rents affordable.

The three options are:

	Option 1	Option 2 – Recommended by the Rent Setting Group	Option 3
Rent Level	1.75%	2%	2.25%
Capital spend (this is money invested to buy or upgrade fixed, physical, non-consumable assets, such as buildings and equipment)	Additional borrowing of an estimated £823,000 to maintain capital spend (cumulative position for 4 year period 2021/22 – 2024/25)	£18 million capital spend over the year	Reduced borrowing of an estimated £824,000 to maintain capital spend (cumulative position for 4 year period 2021/22 – 2024/25) which could be used to fund additional stock improvements
How many new builds?	Potential reduction in new build homes	70 new homes over the year	70 new homes – any additional funds will be used to improve existing stock
What stock improvements can tenants expect?	Potential reductions in stock improvements, which could mean delays to completion of the ongoing bathroom replacement programme	450 Gas & Electric Heating installations; 600 properties receiving external wall insulation & energy efficiency measures; 700 bathrooms.	In addition to planned improvements listed in Option 2, for example: 40 Gas Heating installations (including loft insulation); 40 Electric Heating installations (including loft insulation); 34 External Wall Insulations; 33 Window & Door Replacements

The tenant representatives recommend that tenants choose Option 2 which would mean a rent rise of 2%. This option is the minimum rise needed to deliver the current Business Plan without additional borrowing. It, along with Scottish Government grant funding, would enable us to build 70 new homes in 2020-21, as well as these improvements to existing stock: 450 Gas & Electric Heating installations, 600 properties receiving external wall insulation & energy efficiency measures, 700 bathrooms.

The graph below shows the average weekly rents of Angus Council over the past five years compared to other neighbouring local authorities (figures from the Scottish Housing Regulator). Unfortunately, the updated figures for 2019-20 are not yet available.

Angus Council average weekly rents

How the rent increase options would affect average Angus Council weekly rents

To have your say on the rent options,

please complete the survey online by 6 November 2020*.

*Please note this consultation is open to current Angus Council tenants only

Get Involved in Rent Setting!

We asked tenants in a recent survey:

Would you like to know more about how we spend your rent money?

Would you like to influence how rent levels are spent?

We had a huge response so we are holding our rent setting meeting online this year and our tenants are invited…

The meeting will be friendly and informal and will take place on:

Monday 12^th October

at 6:00pm

Tenants can join in by asking questions or can remain quiet and simply type in questions and comments if they prefer, whatever suits.

To find out more and book a place please contact:

bonij@angus.gov.uk

Places are limited so please book early to avoid disappointment.

Talk to Us About Performance – Online!

If you answered our Tenant Involvement Survey, you’ll be interested to know what we found.

Some of the key messages we got from the survey were:

• tenants were keen to know more about how we spend their rent money and how we perform
• they also wanted us to listen to tenants more and have more online events

So, for the first time, we will hold an online meeting about our performance in the last year. Don’t miss this chance find out more and get involved from the comfort of your own home.

We will explain how we have performed in areas such as

• the time taken to re-let properties,
• rent arrears, and
• the length of time taken to complete repairs.

We will send more information before the meeting so that participants can send in any questions in advance to shape the discussion on the day. Don’t be nervous, you won’t have to speak if you don’t want to, you can type in questions during the meeting or just listen and get back to us with your thoughts and comment later.

If you would like to take part please email cldcarnoustie@angus.gov.uk

Places are limited so best to book early!

We Want to Improve Tenant Involvement in Our Services – Tell Us How

Are you an Angus Council tenant?

We want to make sure that every tenant who wants to be involved in decision-making about the housing service has the opportunity to get involved. Please take our short survey to help improve how we involve tenants in shaping our service.

Celebrating Tenant Achievement at Holyrood

Members of the Tenants Steering Group enjoyed a trip to Holyrood this week, to visit the Scottish Parliament, and to meet with Kevin Stewart, the Minister for Housing.

The group had a sit-down meeting with Kevin, and discussed a number if topics, including the activities the group have been involved in – scrutiny, Rent Setting. HRA and much more.

Members of the group were presented with their Adult Achievement Awards (AAA) by Kevin. These were the first AAAs that Kevin had presented and he explained it was honour to be in a position to present the group with their awards. We would also like to say congratulations to our hard-working Steering Group members!

 

Angus Tenant and Community Engagement Strategy website launch

We’ve launched our new website for the Angus Tenant and Community Engagement Strategy. Now all the information you need about tenant participation is in one convenient online place. Find out how we developed this strategy and how to get involved by checking it out here.

 

 

 

New Tenant Participation Strategy Launched

The launch of the Angus Tenant & Community Engagement Strategy 2019-2022 took place last week at Arbroath Academy. The new strategy was presented by our tenant representatives and two elected members, Cllr Tommy Stewart and Cllr Lois Speed.

The purposes of the strategy is to improve how we engage with our tenants and communities and to meet outcomes and standards of the Scottish Social Housing Charter

It sets out 6 priorities:

• Establish an E-panel for consultations and information sharing
• Establish a Scrutineers panel
• Promote and advertise tenant participation in the best format for our tenants and review and revise our information regularly
• Give recognition for learning and participation through awards and accreditations
• Develop local area action plans in partnership with our local Community Housing Teams
• Produce a calendar of tenant participation opportunities

The full Strategy document can be found here.

John Morrow, Service Leader – Housing, highlighted the importance of the strategy for Angus. He said:

At a time of great change, it’s more important than ever for tenants to have a voice in shaping our policies. We want to be sure that what we do reflects the things that are important to customers. Whether that means installing new bathrooms, building new council houses, keeping our rents at some of the lowest in Scotland, or making sure that repairs are done right first time, it’s only through listening to tenant views that we really learn what our priorities should be.

This Tenant Engagement strategy sets out how we will encourage a greater level participation, including a broader representation and age range, as we don’t currently have many young people actively participating. So the Strategy sets out a wider range of communication methods, including the Housing Blog and the new e-panel, designed to reach many more people.

I hope that tenants will play a greater role in helping to keep us on track to deliver good services in return for reasonable rents, and help us demonstrate value for money, not just to our customers, but also to the Scottish Housing Regulator as one of the principles of the Scottish Social Housing Charter. I think if we can help make the link better between the big picture issues, and rents and investment, and what really matters for tenants in their home, then we can get more people interested in being involved.

And that is exactly what this Tenant Engagement Strategy is designed to achieve.