NFA Defends ALMO Record On Decent Homes

Published by JenCooke for National Federation of ALMOs in Housing and also in Central Government

The National Federation of ALMOs (NFA) has responded to the Public Accounts Committee Decent Homes Report released this week, by defending the achievements of ALMOs in delivering the Decent Homes programme.

The report recognises the important contribution of ALMOs in bringing more than 250,000 properties up to the Decent Homes standard, but questioned why ALMOs have spent roughly £10,000 per property on improvements compared to the £6,000 per property spent by Local Authorities.

The NFA has explained that ALMOs inherited a housing stock in a worse condition than other authorities which required a greater level of investment to meet the standard.

Gwyneth Taylor, Policy Director at the National Federation of ALMOs said:

“ALMOs are spending more on Decent Homes because the ALMO programme was established specifically for those authorities that could not bring their homes back up to decency levels because their stock was in a poorer condition and they could not manage to achieve decency with their own resources.

“If ALMOs did not have a need to spend as much, they would not have been allowed the extra funding and if they were not spending more than the other local authorities it would be a great concern.”

The NFA has also reiterated calls for the government to continue to fund the Decent Homes programme through to completion, following concerns raised in the report which states that ‘funding could be at risk given the likely pressure on public spending’.
The report also describes how a review of the business plans of 15 ALMOs by the Homes and Communities Agency, had concluded that ‘ALMOs have not been over-funded’.

Further commenting on the report, Gwyneth Taylor said: “It is important to remember that there are degrees of subjectivity in the assessment of the Decent Homes standard – for example it is difficult to define disrepair. In addition it is possible for housing providers to only complete certain elements in the Standard, rather than address all of them.

“Because ALMOs had access to the extra funding, they have generally delivered works to a higher standard than some traditional retained stock authorities, in order to save money on long-term maintenance.”

Following the general election in May, the NFA, whose members manage more than half of the country’s council homes, is calling for the new government to ensure that completing the Decent Homes programme remains a priority.

The Public Accounts Committee Decent Homes Report follows the publication of a review into the Decent Homes programme in January by the National Audit Office. This report found that the Decent Homes programme is now expected to finish in 2019 – nine years after the 2010 deadline and at a cost of £37bn compared to the £19bn originally budgeted.

ALMOs have a remarkable record of improving services and involving tenants in key decision making with 37 ALMOs having achieved the Audit Commission’s two-star rating while a further 21 have been awarded the maximum three-star rating; a track record unsurpassed by the housing association or traditional local authority sectors.