G15 statement on the Social Housing Green Paper

  • 15 August 2018

The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government published its much-anticipated Social Housing Green Paper on Tuesday 14 August 2018.

It sets out the government’s proposals for the future of social housing in England and will be the subject of consultation until 6 November 2018.

Commenting on the Green Paper, Paul Hackett, chair of the G15 and chief executive of Optivo, said:

“We welcome that the government is putting social housing tenants first in this green paper. Social housing plays a vital role in our society and it’s right that government takes seriously the unfair and completely inaccurate stigma that our tenants have suffered from in the past.

“Housing associations are always working to improve. There’s a real desire to do more to involve residents, to ensure we’re being transparent and to keep improving the services we offer tenants. We’re not starting from scratch. There’s excellent resident involvement going on right now, all over the country in associations of all types and sizes and we can all learn from the best examples.

“As housing associations, we’ve had to adapt in recent years, innovating and finding new ways of raising the funds needed to keep delivering the affordable housing this country needs. But building and managing homes is far from all we do. Against a backdrop of strained public services, we help improve tenants’ lives and communities by providing employment, skills and education programmes and investing in local facilities. This is making a real difference and we can work with government to achieve more together.

“The green paper is a step forward for social housing tenants, but higher grant levels and bigger funding programmes will be required in the long term if we’re going to tackle the housing crisis.”