Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities
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Landlords get new guidance on tackling nuisance neighbours
Social housing landlords today received new guidance to help them measure their success in tackling anti-social behaviour. A toolkit, developed by HouseMark and the Social Landlords' Crime and Nuisance Group (SLCNG) for Communities and Local Government, offers practical help and advice on collecting, interpreting and using information.
The toolkit explains in easy to understand terms, the information that landlords should collect on anti-social behaviour in order to target their staff time and resources effectively.
It will also assist landlords in meeting the requirements of the Respect Standard for Housing Management and encourage even more landlords to sign up to the standard itself.
The guidance has been developed in close consultation with landlords and key national organisations. A panel of 28 practitioners, reflecting the range of different social landlords, has guided the development of the toolkit to ensure that it reflects the needs of the sector.
Junior Housing Minister Iain Wright MP said:
"Tackling anti-social behaviour and helping to create a culture of Respect within our communities is a key part of a social landlord's responsibilities. This toolkit will help them measure and improve how well they perform this important job."
Steve Osborne, executive consultant at HouseMark and manager on the project said;
"The Toolkit is a non-regulatory tool that sits well with the Cave reports recommendations for greater emphasis for housing provider self-assessment".
Peter Jackson, managing director at SLCNG said;
"The toolkit has been produced in collaboration with members of HouseMark and SLCNG and will be even more relevant having been influenced by the views of front line staff"
Over 350 social landlords have now signed-up to the Respect Standard in the 12 months since it was launched. Six out of ten social housing tenants, over 5 million residents, live in homes covered by the benchmark.
The Respect Standard for Housing Management: A Performance Improvement Toolkit for Landlords is available on the Communities and Local Government website (http://www.communities.gov.uk).
HouseMark and the SLCNG are running ten workshops focusing on the outcomes of action to tackle ASB from October to December 2007 - see http://www.housemark.co.uk for more information.
Notes to Editors
1. The Respect Standard was launched on 17 August 2006.
2. The Standard is built around six core commitments:
Accountability, leadership, and commitment
Landlords need to make a visible commitment to the community so that everyone is clear they take issues of anti-social behaviour and Respect seriously and will deliver what they say they will.
Empowering and reassuring residents
Landlords and the community need to work as one through involving residents and giving them input into decision making. Engagement and effective communications act to reassure and empower communities.
Prevention and early intervention
Landlords can play a key role in preventing anti-social behaviour from occurring. Where it does occur if problems are addressed quickly this often gets the best results.
Tailored services for residents and provision of support for victims and witnesses Success rests on people being prepared to report and then give support to agencies in taking action. Every case and every person deserves a robust, tailored and sensitive response.
Protecting Communities through swift enforcement
Government has provided landlords with the tools they need to tackle a whole range of anti-social behaviour. Landlords need to understand how tools work and be prepared to use them quickly to protect communities.
Support to tackle the causes of anti-social behaviour
Provision of support can put an end to unacceptable behaviour by tackling underlying causes. This leads to sustainable outcomes and gets people's lives back on track.
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