Media Coverage - Emergency Housing

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Permalink Reply by Michael Anderson on January 28, 2014 at 6:14

I agree but the numbers in need of housing (over 10,000 on the waiting list) and the number of vacant social housing properties available each year for letting (less than 100 even in wards with the highest number of social housing units like Northumberland Park) the numbers don't stack up.

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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on January 27, 2014 at 17:51

Below is the latest email update from Phil Harris, Deputy Director, Community Housing Services to Cllr George Meehan. As I expected, it turns out that - strictly in accordance with the Law of Rising & Sinking Decisions -  responsibility is shared by the person at the bottom for not checking properly; and the Press Association for asking an ambiguous question.

So nothing to do with  poor systems. And it seems that W. Edwards Deming's Red Bead Experiment passed Haringey by.

On the other hand, from one viewpoint the £197m figure turns out to be accurate.   It was the figure for: "the total expenditure on the different types of temporary accommodation, as well as the extra costs of repairs, maintenance, salaries, etc" .

But this probably wasn't how other London councils interpreted the question.  So unless I have got the wrong end of the stick,  a key problem seems to be that the 32 London boroughs may not have agreed common formats for collecting and reporting these figures.

Anyone in the data collection and statistics trades care to comment?

----- Original Message -----
From: Phil Harris,  Deputy Director, Community Housing Services
To: Cllr Meehan George; Labour Councillors ; Lib Dem Councillors ; Independent Councillors ; Cllr Stanton Alan
Cc:  Nick Walkley, Chief Executive
Sent: Monday, January 27, 2014 4:05 PM
Subject: Media coverage - emergency housing

Dear Councillor Meehan

Thank you for your e-mail of Friday.

I agree with you that, when information is provided, it must be checked for accuracy. Unfortunately, on this occasion, the Officer did not make a final check with his line manager before sending the response.

The Press Association asked the Council to confirm “the amount of money spent by the authority on emergency housing for the last four years”. 

Assuming that the journalist was referring to the Council’s use of temporary accommodation, the Officer requested a breakdown of all temporary accommodation expenditure from the Council’s Finance Team and this was the information given to the Press Association.

The term ‘emergency housing’ can be used differently by different councils. In Haringey, we use the term ‘Emergency Accommodation’ to refer to bed and breakfast and nightly purchased annexes only.

In this instance, only the expenditure on ‘Emergency Accommodation’ should have been provided. When responding to the FOI, the Officer incorrectly provided details of the total expenditure on the different types of temporary accommodation, as well as the extra costs of repairs, maintenance, salaries, etc. This is why Haringey’s reported spend was so much higher than other London boroughs.

The expenditure figures that I included in my e-mail to Members on Friday relate only to the amount of money that the Council paid to housing suppliers for bed and breakfast and nightly-purchased annexes (our definition of ‘Emergency Accommodation’) during the four year period.

Please be assured that action has been taken to ensure that, in future, clarification is always sought if an FOI request is in any way unclear and that all responses are signed off by either myself or a member of my Senior Management Team before they are sent.

Additional guidance and training is to be provided for all housing staff that are involved in responding to FOI requests.

Yours sincerely

Phil Harris

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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on February 1, 2014 at 12:55

I've been thinking more about this. Because I still feel I'm left in ignorance.

Are there reliable comparative figures? if so where and whose? What do they show about the movement of people within London and in and out of Haringey? What are the particular implications for different groups of people made homeless or moved from place to place? For families; children; disabled and particularly vulnerable groups?

I want to know what's happening in my neighbourhood, my borough and my city. I'm not interested in which person at the bottom of the pecking order is to blame. Nor which person at the top will now sign-off the information.

I want a culture where our Council - from top to bottom - believes and strives to provide us, the residents, with accurate reliable information which we can use to engage more effectively in the democratic decision-making process.

The model I have in my mind is when your doctor tells you - to the best of their knowledge - what's wrong. Or when you find a surveyor who gives you a frank and evidenced assessment of the flat or house you're thinking of buying. In either case, I want hard, trustworthy information and honest assessments.  The bad news and the good news. I'd like it in a form which I can understand and check.

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Permalink Reply by Ruth Valentine on February 2, 2014 at 14:58

But the real scandal is what's happening to homeless families in the borough.  The majority are offered rehousing in Wolverhampton, usually with no chance to view either the town or the property.  For single parents of young children, especially, to be moved to any area where you know no-one & may find no-one else who speaks your language is a disaster. 

If you're lucky (relatively) you'll be in 'temporary accommodation' ie private rented, in Haringey or another borough.  The council through housing benefit pays a fortune for these places, many of which are in appalling condition, infested with mice and rats, damp and insanitary; so they're also paying for environmental health to go in. 

All this is not simply a borough problem.  The housing benefit cap means that people are moved here from other more expensive boroughs.  + fewer and fewer landlords accept people on housing benefit (but how can you pay £340 pw for a three-bed place out of low pay?). 

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