Issue - meetings

Housing Performance Report

Meeting: 05/11/2019 - Renewal, Recreation and Housing Policy Development and Scrutiny Committee (Item 46)

46 HOUSING PERFORMANCE REPORT pdf icon PDF 229 KB

Minutes:

Report HPR19001

 

Members considered a summary of the work undertaken by the Housing Needs Service together with an update of key performance statistics.

 

The Assistant Director Housing outlined the report and referring to paragraph 3.3 advised that the number of homeless approaches to the Council had increased by four and Housing Register applications had increased by 26 but remained stable.  There had been a decrease in the number of nightly paid accommodation households due to the More Homes Bromley scheme which was in the process of concluding.  The number of properties available from housing associations had decreased by an average of 16 per month and moves into the private sector had decreased by one-third.

 

The Chairman commented on the usefulness of the report and requested that comparison column(s) be added to the headline statistics.  More graphs like the Temporary Accommodation Data set out in paragraph 4.7 would be useful.

 

It would also be helpful to incorporate key performance targets i.e. how many people the Council aimed for in each service including how long people remained in temporary accommodation and on the Housing Register.

 

Members were informed that the waiting times for accommodation for accepted homes households were:-

 

·  two bedroom accommodation – in excess of 4½ years;

·  three bedroom accommodation - 3+ years; and

·  one bedroom accommodation - approximately 12 months to 2 years.

 

The Assistant Director Housing stated that some control was needed in regard to the housing market.  Having looked on the property website Zoopla, only 6% of properties advertised in July were affordable for people reliant on benefits who were seeking to rent privately.

 

In regard to the approaches to service on page 114, para. 4.4 of the report, Members were advised that the 56 days referred to in the table was the statutory turnaround time.

 

The ‘lack of action’ referred to on page 117, para. 6.2 of the report, related to following up progress on cases.  However, officers were now more reactive and dealt with cases quickly and efficiently.  Changes had also been made to IT systems, processes and procedures.

 

RESOLVED that the report be noted.