Opportunity for people to join new tenant panel designed to improve social housing in the borough
Great Yarmouth Borough Council has announced plans to work with its social housing tenants in a new drive to improve services.
The borough is one of only two local authorities in Norfolk that still has its own council houses - maintaining a stock of more than 5,000 homes - and wants to involve tenants to raise standards and more effectively deal with the issues that matter most to people.
Councillor Graham Plant, portfolio holder for Operational Property and Asset Management at GYBC, said: ''Our teams work really hard to provide the best homes and services they can for people.
''However, we know it is the tenants themselves who are best placed to tell us what works well and what we can do better. We want residents to be at the heart of how their homes are managed and how services operate.''
The council now wants to find 12 local people to form a new Tenant Engagement Panel, which will be empowered to hold it to account and influence priorities for works.
Membership of the panel is open to anyone who is a Great Yarmouth Borough Council tenant, and it will meet with council staff at least four times a year to provide local knowledge and insight.
The aim is for the panel to consist of a diverse range of tenants from the borough so that policies, improvements and complaints can be addressed transparently and more effectively, with service users at the centre of decision making.
Councillor Plant said: ''The panel will have a broad remit to consider everything from anti-social behaviour, communal areas, housing complaints, fly-tipping or environmental issues. As well as anything that might be considered to improve areas.
''The panel is designed to help shape solutions with the council to improve the quality of life for all of our tenants right across the borough.''
Once bedded in, the council hopes the panel will help it better deliver on its aims of making sure tenants are safe in their home, know how their landlord is performing, have complaints dealt with promptly and have a good-quality home and neighbourhood to live in.
A spokesperson for the council said increasing tenant participation from the ground up will help it build on the strong local links its teams have already developed, putting plans in place to identify and deliver improvements.
The proposal follows social housing guidelines laid out in the Government's new Consumer Standards regulations, which say housing providers need to support tenants and provide opportunities for them to challenge and scrutinise services delivered by their landlord.
The council has examined similar panels in other areas and believes it has designed a model that will successfully enable tenants to influence how services are delivered from their perspective via a wide-ranging remit including challenging and monitoring performance, recommending changes, reviewing and shaping policies and procedures, scrutiny and making sure the tenant voice is recognised.
Councillor Plant said: ''This is unique opportunity for 12 enthusiastic local people to work with us to help provide the best homes possible. There will be support and training available and membership of the panel is open to anyone who is a GYBC tenant or leaseholder. So, if you'd like to make a difference in your community we'd love to hear from you.
''We are really looking forward to getting underway and delivering real change and improvements for all of our tenants.''
To find out more about the new Tenant Engagement Panel and to register your interest in joining, please call our the Social Housing team on 01493 01493 846660 or email [email protected].
