Shapps: Helping Tenants Take Control

Plans to make it easier for council tenants to take control of their local neighbourhood and services have been announced by Housing Minister Grant Shapps.  Mr Shapps challenged tenants who feel their landlords have neglected their neighbourhood to exercise their rights and take matters into their own hands.  The Minister is consulting on plans to strengthen and streamline two key rights that can help tenants achieve this.  The Right to Manage gives tenants the chance to take over the day-to-day management of housing services such as cleaning, repairs, refurbishment and security. New proposals will streamline paperwork involved in transferring management responsibilities to a tenant organisation.  The Right to Transfer allows tenants to request the ownership of council homes in their neighbourhood to be transferred from the council to a local housing association. This could be because tenants believe this new landlord could provide better services like cleaning and security or bring more investment into their area such as improvement to peoples homes and the environment.  At the moment tenants can put forward a case for transfer, but councils have no obligation to consider their proposals. The changes proposed will strengthen these rights, requiring councils to work with tenants to explore transfer requests.  The consultation ends on 23 May 2012 and can be accessed either via the Consultation Page within The Bulletin or by downloading from the CLG website.