We were delighted to welcome MHCLG Housing Delivery Director Cathy Francis and members of her team to the Tees Valley on Thursday 12th March. Cathy and her team undertook a day-long tour, taking in sites of opportunity, challenge and recent success.  This included: The huge SSI industrial site in Redcar, now in the hands of […]

“Our staff are the key to our ability to deliver excellent services to members”. Catherine Wilmot, Executive Director (Operations & Finance), Northern Housing Consortium talks about why empowering staff through training and development is so important to the NHC and how we strive to support staff wellbeing. Having worked most of my professional career within […]

Smart Energy GB in Communities National Energy Action (NEA) is pleased to announce that the 2020 Smart Energy GB in Communities programme is now live, with grant funding and support being targeted to organisations reaching people aged over 65 who are unaware of smart meters. This group will have a very limited knowledge and understanding […]

Last month around 100 of the region’s engaged residents returned to The Principal York for the Northern Housing Consortium and Tenant Advisor’s 9th Annual Tenant Panel conference. The theme of the day was ‘influencing services and decision makers’ and with a General Election on the horizon, delegates used the day to produce their own ‘Resident’s […]

As attention turns to the year ahead, we take a look back at some of the work our members helped us to achieve in the year 2019. Our work programme has been busy, covering a new corporate plan, a focused influencing agenda and an exciting new collaboration to launch Consortium Procurement Construction, offering our members […]

We have learnt through our roundtable events that housing providers and local authorities are increasingly having to take up the slack and are investing increasing resources to ensure the smooth running of the Universal Credit system for the benefits of claimants and to maintain sustainable tenancies. In order to quantify the extent to which members […]

Representatives from Crisis, Youth Homeless North East, and both local authorities and housing associations shared their experiences, latest research and recommendations around tackling homelessness at an event organised by the Northern Housing Consortium (NHC) in Leeds on the 25th November. Access to housing is a fundamental part of solving homelessness. There are now 84,740 households, […]

Look out for our new online portal ‘MyNHC’ launching at the Northern Housing Summit (but available to everyone!) from the 5th November. MyNHC will give members: better oversight of how your organisation works with us the ability to book events, pay online and manage event bookings access documentation view procurement information and much more. If […]

The evening of Monday 21st October saw our Executive Director of Policy and Public Affairs, Brian Robson, give evidence at the second session of the Housing, Communities and Local Government Select Committee regarding the long-term delivery of social and affordable rented housing (View the call for evidence here). The Northern Housing Consortium was invited to […]

Unproductive Brits ‘waste’ the equivalent of 30 WORKING DAYS per year on their office email, it has emerged. Office workers typically spend around two hours each day browsing their inbox, according to research. However, the survey found around half of this time is wasted by accidentally re-reading messages, needlessly checking for updates and sending emails […]

Neurodiversity is not just about ‘doing the right thing’ anymore. GCHQ, Enterprise Rent-a-Car, Direct Line Group and JPMorgan Chase are actively getting it ‘right’ and supporting neurodiverse employees throughout their employment – benefiting both the employee AND the organisation. Neurodiverse employees with Dyspraxia, Dyslexia, Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, Dyscalculia, Autistic Spectrum, Tourette Syndrome and more, […]

  Finding and keeping the talent your organisation needs to succeed has always been a challenge. A recent CBI survey said that 56% of organisations cannot fill the jobs that they currently have available, and 80% of CEOs said that “Talent” was their single biggest issue, more important than concerns about the economy or their […]

Today marks the centenary of the Housing Act 1919. The ‘Addison Act’, as it was commonly known, paved the way for large-scale council housing and was driven by Health Minister at the time, Christopher Addison. We were excited to see what our members are doing to mark the occasion, including activity from Sheffield City Council […]

Our Director of Member Engagement, Kate Maughan talks us through the Digital Innovation in Housing Seminar taking place next month. Our digital innovation seminar is taking place on 18th July in Leeds – book your place here. Digital innovation is now recognised as key to an organisation’s success. Whether it’s bringing in new technology, making […]

It’s been an exciting time for the NHC! Earlier this month, our Deputy Chief Executive, Tracy Harrison was appointed to the role of Chief Executive, and we welcomed a new Executive Director (Policy & Public Affairs), Brian Robson who joined us from Homes England. The new executive team also includes Executive Director, Catherine Wilmot, who […]

Earlier this month we marked the retirement of our Chief Executive, Jo Boaden CBE, with a very special reception at the House of Lords. The event was hosted by Lord Best and guests heard from NHC Chair, Tom Miskell OBE who championed Jo’s great work in building the NHC into the organisation that it is […]

By Chris Bartlett, Business Unit Director – Public Sector, SoftwareONE Consumer expectations of how services should be delivered today are high. Increasingly, we have come to see online, convenient access to public services – whether paying council tax, reporting a pothole, or applying for a school space – as the norm. In April 2016, the […]

In what is described as ‘a generational change’ to the lettings sector, Section 21 evictions, known as no fault evictions, will be abolished under plans to be put out to consultation. The announcement came with no warning and despite considerable pressure from landlord organisations following last year’s consultation on longer tenancies who said that the […]

Building on the leadership and management training opportunities running over the course of the year, the NHC continues to partner with Abode – the home of education and training for the housing and community sectors, to offer three courses designed specifically for those on the frontline of housing management. Here, Abode training consultants Gill Bramfitt and Claire Harvey talk […]

Advice was published by the Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government (MHCLG)  on 18 December last year on ‘external wall systems that do not incorporate Aluminium Composite Material’ – in other words, buildings where the type of cladding used on the Grenfell Tower is not present. Despite this, MHCLG has advised that there are […]

Landlords have a legal requirement to ensure that a property is safe before letting it to a new tenant and local authorities have a statutory duty to keep the housing conditions in their area under review. It is now almost thirteen years since the introduction of the Housing Health and Safety Rating System (HHSRS). Introduced […]

The cross-party forum for parliamentarians to discuss and advance northern specific housing challenges, the APPG Housing in the North, met again this week to explore further how housing can play a central role in supporting personal health. The group, made up of MP’s and Lords of all political persuasions, heard from a range of speakers […]

On 20 March 2019, the Homes (Fitness for Human Habitation) Act 2018 (The Act) comes into force in England and Wales amending sections 8 to 10 of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1985. The Act creates an obligation on landlords to make sure dwellings provided are fit for human habitation from the start of their […]

Karl Dickman, Product Manager at Home Group, explains why he set up the Housing Association Digital Forum and how already it’s been a great success. I started the Housing Association Digital Forum in September 2018 with the first participants invited from the North East, and Yorkshire and Humber. I set it up, primarily, because I […]

The Social Housing Commission (the Commission) is an independent cross-party body which was set up by housing charity Shelter. On 08 January 2019 the Commission returned a year’s worth of findings in the form of a report entitled ‘Building for our future: A vision for social housing’ which aims to bolster tenants’ rights in the […]

Over the summer Homes England launched the Community Housing Fund (CHF) (£163m). Both phase 1 revenue support and phase 2 capital funds are now open for bids. At Homes England we are supporting community led housing activity and we know through enquiries and actual bids that communities are developing projects throughout the region. An element […]

As 2018 draws to a close, this will be my last Christmas message as Chief Executive of the NHC, as I will be retiring next spring and handing the reins over to our Deputy Chief Executive, Tracy Harrison. I look forward to seeing her take the organisation from strength to strength. In the years I’ve […]

Tracy Harrison, Deputy Chief Executive, Northern Housing Consortium Last month’s Budget delivered some welcome certainties and a shift in sentiment from government towards working with the social housing sector as part of the solution. The one clear certainty was the commitment to the national supply target of 300,000 new builds a year, this was despite […]

Yvonne Castle, new NHC Board member and Chief Executive of Johnnie Johnson Housing When we talk about our pending crisis of an increasing population in the UK due to ageing we think about: pressure on the NHS; woeful Residential Care (at Southern Cross, winterbourne view and more recently Allied Healthcare), the scale of dementia issues, […]

The Northern Housing Consortium (NHC) was delighted to join Lord Best and a variety of stakeholders in delivering the recent Rural Housing for an Ageing Population Conference.  Alongside ADASS, Housing LIN, and the LGA, the NHC welcomed over one hundred delegates to the Harrogate Convention Centre to explore the opportunities and challenges of providing fit-for-purpose […]

The long awaited, much trailed Social Housing Green Paper announced by the former Secretary of State for Housing as a “wide-ranging, top-to-bottom review of the issues facing the sector” and by the current Secretary of State as “a landmark opportunity for major reform” was finally published on 14 August. It was published alongside: A Review […]

Over the past year Government policy has understandably turned to focus on the social housing sector and particularly the needs of residents. Against this backdrop, a strong attendance of over 100 tenants and housing staff attended the National Resident Involvement Conference in York to make sense of the recent changes in housing policy as well […]

Chief Executives from the NHC membership were present at the last meeting of the All Party Parliamentary Group Housing in North (APPG HiN) to hear how innovative approaches were being used to support older people to live independent lives.   APPG HiN Chair Ian Mearns MP also welcomed Lord Best, who updated attendees on the APPG […]

For over 18 years the Northern Housing Consortium’s Anti-Social Behaviour Study Group has provided an invaluable forum for stakeholders to meet, discuss, and develop the services they provide. Group members, taken from the NHC membership and beyond, have heard from expert speakers outlining the changes and challenges brought about by government policies.  These have included […]

Melanie Rees, CIH CIH’s Rethinking Social Housing project is now in full swing. Formally launched in January, we wanted to get a national debate going about the role and purpose of social housing – and we’ve been blown away by the response we’ve had!  We developed a toolkit to help people to hold their own […]

On 1st  October 2017, the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, announced proposals to address the imbalance of power in the private rented market by regulating letting and managing agents. A call for evidence sought views on a new regulatory model and how best to protect and empower tenants and leaseholders. The Northern […]

DCLG publishes consultation on draft homelessness code of guidance The Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG) has published a draft statutory code of guidance which will accompany the Homelessness Reduction Act (HRA), due to come into force in April 2018. The DCLG has now published a revised draft the Homelessness Code of Guidance (“Code”) […]

“What if we train them and they leave?” “What if we don’t and they stay?” I love this quote as it says a lot about the way we approach training and development in our teams. I often hear of businesses reducing the amount of training they provide when the pressure is on. Whether it is […]

In its guest blogs, NHC Supporter Ward Hadaway offers the legal perspective and some guidance on some of the social housing sector’s most pressing issues. In this edition: the Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG) Building Safety programme. The Grenfell Tower tragedy has focused attention on the quality and safety of high-rise buildings across […]