Housing: National Tenant Body

Question

Asked by

To ask His Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the case for establishing a national tenant body, as recommended by the Housing Ombudsman.

My Lords, with strong landlord bodies in both the private and social rented sector, we agree that tenants should also have a strong voice in influencing and scrutinising social housing policy. The Government are committed to listening to tenants and acting on what we hear. The social housing resident panel was established in 2022 to give social housing tenants direct access to Ministers and officials during policy development. We expanded its scope in 2024 beyond its initial focus on quality reforms to all social housing policy. However, our engagement with tenants has shown that they want a national body that is tenant-led and independent of government and landlords. We will continue to work with tenant groups as they explore how best to establish a national tenant voice.

I thank the Minister for that Answer and am pleased at the positive response. We could be forgiven for thinking that everything in the garden is rosy and it is all going well—hurrah!—so why did the ombudsman, the National Housing Federation, the Commons Select Committee and other prominent voices feel the need to advocate publicly, loudly and recently for such a body? Why do Ministers refuse to meet two nationally significant tenant groups, G15 and Stop Social Housing Stigma, claiming the “no diary availability” excuse? I would like to think that this is simply a communications failure. Does the Minister see a role for government in creating the independent national body that we all seem to want to see, yet nobody knows about it or how it is going to happen?

I am grateful to the noble Baroness for her question and for championing this issue on behalf of tenants. I have met with G15; I went to its parliamentary session and had a look at its very good report on social housing stigma. I agree that we need to make sure that the tenant voice is heard. I have also met with the regulator of social housing twice, I think, since I took over the regulators. The social housing regulator is looking very carefully at how to increase the emphasis on the tenant voice. It is very important that this national body, whatever it is going to be, is tenant-led. I am happy to meet any tenant groups to move this forward. We all want to see tenants having a powerful voice in designing social housing policy.

My Lords, I wonder whether I can support the Minister and the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill. A lot of work is being done already in the social housing sector by the NHS, and in the private-rented sector by Shelter, Generation Rent, Acorn and the NUS. It is very important that all types of tenants are represented in this national body. There are a lot of organisations involved here. Is my noble friend prepared to go a little further and suggest that the Government have a role—maintaining distance, obviously, because that is clearly needed—in setting this organisation up, perhaps with a little seed corn to supplement the rather meagre resources that many of these organisations have?

I thank my noble friend for her question. The important thing is that we get the balance right between ensuring that tenants feel this body is genuinely tenant-led and doing what we can to help convene the right people around the table to bring this forward. I will continue discussions with all the relevant housing organisations and bodies to make sure that we are doing all we can to help move this forward. It is time we had some real action in this area.

My Lords, many housing associations and local councils already have tenant panels and dispute resolution mechanisms. Can the Minister explain how a new national body would avoid unnecessary duplication while genuinely improving outcomes for renters? If such a body were established, can the noble Lord the Minister—the noble Baroness the Minister; I do apologise, but we are gender neutral—explain whether the Government would envisage it as a mandatory authority or a voluntary advisory service, and how would it interact with private landlords and housing associations that already have tenant engagement schemes?

The noble and learned Lord puts his finger on one of the issues. It is very important that at local level, at a specific housing association level and for local councils that have their own housing, tenants are able to have a voice in what is going on with that organisation. The movement towards a national body is more to help work with Ministers and officials on national housing policy where it relates to social housing. As the Government have committed £39 billion of spending on this revolution in social and affordable housing, it will be particularly important that we have a proper body to advise on national policy on social housing. I look forward to working with all those who want to move this forward, but that does not mean that the local voice will not retain its importance.

It is very good news from the Minister that she is aware of this, but it is obvious since Grenfell and other failures, and since the Renters’ Rights Bill, that this is absolutely necessary. Where is the sense of urgency to get this up and running? Is it simply a case of tenants’ organisations not having the money to convene a proper conference to make proper decisions about the way forward?

I agree with the noble Baroness. Following the findings of the Grenfell inquiry, it is clear that the social housing system was not fit for purpose and that tenants were ignored. It is quite right that apologies were made, and those failings definitely contributed to the Grenfell tragedy. As the noble Baroness will be aware, we are delivering an extensive programme of reform to drive up standards in social housing through regulation and enforcement. We are about to bring Awaab’s law before the House, strengthening the tenant voice and improving access to redress. Those new standards put the tenant voice at their heart. My understanding is that the tenants themselves were very keen that this be both funded and driven by the sector itself. The Government are very keen to do whatever we can to assist with that.

I am not usually very keen on quangos, but at the heart of this is the issue of trust. Tenants feel as though they are getting mixed messages: when the Housing Ombudsman suggests something, the Government say it is a good idea but then dilly-dally, and trust is undermined. The Government should be clearer on this. Also, there are issues involving tenants that need a national voice. Could the national body, for example, deal with the challenges of rental properties being turned into houses in multiple occupancy—an issue that I know worries tenants—and with the rumours that Serco is repurposing HMOs for asylum seekers, to replace hotels? I am not saying that is happening, but there is a lack of clarity. Can the Minister clarify this, and does she see the need for a national body that will help reassure tenants, rather than simply being a dead quango?

I can only repeat what I have said: if tenants want this body, we will work with them and do our best to make it happen. I do not think that anyone is dilly-dallying, but it is very important that the tenant voice be made clear in how this is set up, what it will do and how it will move forward. I am very pleased to work on that and to do what I can to move it forward, as I know my fellow Ministers in the department will be. It is particularly important now, given the massive investment the Government are bringing forward in social housing. The Secretary of State has already said that she wants 60% of the housing from that £39 billion to be social housing. We need to move this forward as quickly as possible, so I will do everything I can to move that on.

My Lords, the Minister said in some of her answers that the tenant’s voice is heard, but it is often heard and then ignored, as was so cruelly exposed by the Grenfell Tower tragedy and other social housing-related deaths, where complaints were made about the need for repairs but nothing was done. It is all right being heard, but tenants need to have their voice respected and acted on. How on earth can the Government make those changes?

I hope I can be clear in responding to the noble Baroness that, for too long, landlords in all tenure types have not always taken tenants’ complaints as seriously as they should. Bringing forward Awaab’s law is part of the response to that. Many noble Lords will have heard social landlords say that damp and mould were caused by lifestyle issues. I fundamentally disagree with that, and I am very pleased that Awaab’s law is coming forward to deal with it. We have also put in place a number of other steps, including the £1 million tenant experience innovation fund, supporting social landlords and tenants in working together to test and scale up innovative projects to engage social housing tenants; and our Four Million Homes training programme, which supports tenants with the skills to form organisations that can challenge their landlords at local level. So there is a lot going on, but there is a lot more to do.