Issue - meetings

Councillor Donald Nannestad, Portfolio Holder for Quality Housing:

a)    presented a report to Performance Scrutiny Committee Covering the following main areas:

-       Homelessness

-       Tenancy Services

-       Voids

-       Housing Repairs

-       Housing Investment

-       New Build

-       Decarbonisation

-       Private Sector Housing

-       Health

b)    invited members comments and questions.

Question: Members asked what needed to be changed in Tower Blocks to get them up to an acceptable standard.

Response: A lot of information had been gathered, such as who needed help in an event of an evacuation. A full fire door review had taken place and fire doors had been upgraded. Work had taken place with Lincolnshire Fire and Rescue and fire procedures needed to be continuously checked and rehearsed in order for residents and the Fire Brigade to understand what needed to be done in an emergency.

Question: A record was kept of who the tenants were in flats and members asked how rescue teams would know who was in each flat at a time of emergency as some residents work etc.

Response: Rescue teams would not know who was in each flat at what time and it would be difficult to find out.

Comment: Cllr Smalley commented that she attended the fire exercise at Shuttleworth House and found that the information provided by Lincolnshire Fire and Rescue was good, but the number of tenants that got involved was disappointing.

Question: Members asked if there needed to be more rules as to what was left in communal areas, such as mobility scooters.

Response: Mobility scooters were a problem in high/low rise areas. There was an update to the mobility scooter policy which was being presented at the next Housing Scrutiny Sub Committee Meeting.

Question: Members asked why when a repair is reported, the job gets registered as completed when though the work hadn’t been completed.

Response: There were incidents where an operative had completed most of a job and then went back to finish it off but couldn’t gain access to a property. There is work that needed to be done regarding this as there were issues with the IT system used as it was very old. Appointments were being re-booked without tenants being contacted which was unacceptable and needed to be changed. There were incidences of jobs being attended but the job was not what was on the list so took longer to mend but other jobs were missed in the meantime. Officers were looking at extending hours/shifts to try and accommodate tenants more.

Comment: Members commented that it would be good if tenants could be contacted to say when the operatives were on their way which may save time and journey costs etc.

Question: Members asked if a job number was created when jobs were logged.

Response: Officers were not sure and would feed this back to the committee.

Question: Members asked how repairs got reported.

Response: Most of the repairs were reported through tenants calling Customer Services and then a repair was booked.

Question:  ...  view the full minutes text for item 55