Birmingham council may integrate housing strategy and management as part of plans to overhaul its housing department.

John Lines, cabinet member for housing, said the council had a 鈥渟trategy for everything鈥� but very few concrete details on how they would be implemented.

The divide must be addressed, he said: 鈥淎ll the strategy in the world won鈥檛 cure our problems and I have concerns about the set-up.鈥�

An attempt to unify strategy and landlord services would fly in the face of government policy. One of the arguments for stock transfer is that it allows councils to concentrate on overall strategy while associations take on day-to-day management.

Lines added that he was not certain exactly how housing might be managed and was in consultation with staff and consultants.

Another major concern, he said, was the poor morale of staff. 鈥淔or the last four years, we鈥檝e had a different member for housing and interim housing directors. Sickness and absenteeism rates have gone up.

鈥淚鈥檓 hoping that by bringing stability, we can build up morale.鈥�

Lines said he would go ahead with Tory councillors鈥� pre-election pledge to build new council homes in partnership with private developers. Housing elderly and vulnerable tenants would be the priority.

The council鈥檚 scrutiny committee is preparing a report on the cost of improving Birmingham鈥檚 80,000 council鈥檚 homes.

It will be published in September.

Source

Housing Today