Cheltenham Council to look at taking back control of housing stock

Published by

Peter Davison

Cheltenham Borough Council is to consider taking back control of its housing stock by closing Cheltenham Borough Homes

Cheltenham Borough Council is to consider taking back control of its housing stock by closing Cheltenham Borough Homes, its wholly-owned arms-length management firm.

Due to increasing financial pressures and a changing regulatory framework, councillors will be asked to support a decision to close Cheltenham Borough Homes at the cabinet meeting on 17 October.

The council says tenants, leaseholders and customers that they will not be adversely affected by the changes and, as part of a full consultation process, will be given the opportunity to state their priorities in shaping future housing services.

CBH was originally set up 20 years ago to manage homes on behalf of the council, and has achieved high levels of satisfaction for its customers.

A key reason for its establishment was so that the council could access central government funding to help bring its homes up to the ‘Decent Homes’ standard.

In 2016, government funding for bringing social homes up to this standard came to an end, meaning that any investment in its homes since then is met from council budgets.

The new Social Housing (Regulation) Act means that the council, along with all other local housing authorities and social housing providers, will be subject to increased scrutiny and regulation.

If things go wrong, accountability rests with the council, rather than with CBH as the organisation managing homes on the council’s behalf.

The move to revert housing management back in-house, means that the council can be closer to tenants and leaseholders, hear their views directly and work together with them to shape future housing services.

Councillor Rowena Hay, leader at Cheltenham Borough Council said: "Cheltenham Borough Homes has been at the heart of Cheltenham communities for 20 years. I would like to thank them for all that they have done in that time.

"With new regulations and challenging financial times, we have to change and evolve as organisations. By bringing services together into the council, we have the opportunity to work directly with tenants and leaseholders to further develop best practise, shape future housing needs and grow communities so they continue to thrive.

"It’s so important to us that customers continue to influence housing priorities now and into the future. We will consult with them on what the future of our housing services will look like beyond the transitionary period.

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"Ultimately, we are answerable to our customers, so their voice is critical in how we shape the future delivery of our housing services.

She continued: "The cost of living crisis has also placed significant financial pressures on the provision of services. This crisis has come at a time when we have set out ambitious plans to deliver more affordable homes, and to be carbon net zero by 2030.

"In order to help meet these aims, and to ensure that we continue to provide even more quality homes and invest in our communities long into the future, we have to change the way we do things."

Peter Davison

Peter Davison is deputy editor of The Business Magazine. He has spent his life in journalism – doing work experience in newsrooms in and around Bristol while still at school, and landing his first job on a local newspaper aged 19. By 28 he was the youngest newspaper editor in the country. An early advocate of online news, he spent the first years of the 2000s telling his bosses that the internet posed both the biggest opportunity and greatest threat to the newspaper industry and the art of journalism. He was right on both counts. Since 2006 he has enjoyed a career as a freelance journalist. He lives in rural Wiltshire with one wife, two children, and three cats.