THAMESMEAD TENANTS ALSO FIGHT EXORBITANT CHARGES

IS THIS ANOTHER HOUSING

ASSOCIATION IN THE BUSINESS 

OF “TRANSFORMING PEOPLE`S

LIVES”?

Rocketing housing association rents and hidden extra charges have  also sparked serious protests by tenants  in the London area where another housing association is facing opposition.

And the opposition is far more determined  than the opposition  in Carlisle against Riverside Housing Association`s rocketing  rents and   extra charges.

A group calling themselves Thamesmead Residents have set up their own web site to fight what they call exorbitant charges by Gallions Housing Association which is based at Sidcup (Kent ) and has 7000 houses in the boroughs of Bexley, Greenwich, Havering, Lewisham, Newham and  Tower Hamlets.

The Thamesmead Residents web site says this:

“We are a group of ordinary people living and working in Thamesmead fighting for what we believe to be right, seeking answers to our questions and protesting against the exorbitant  estate charges made by Gallions Housing  to us for services that are not maintained or poorly maintained.
We need helpers, supporters, organisers and committee members. Join us NOW - TELL YOUR NEIGHBOURS!”

The Thamesmead Residents protest (someof the protesters are pictured here)has attracted a lot of national and local publicity.  BBC Radio Five Live plans a special programme about the protest. The programme may also cover the Carlisle protests about Riverside rents and extra charges mentioned in previous posts of this blog.

Here is the link to the Thamesmead Residents web site:www.thamesmeadresidents.co.uk

Three hundred miles away,  the Carlisle protesters are continuing their fight. They have sent a letter to the Editor of the Cumberland News, Carlisle, following an article in that newspaper about hard times at Christmas for some people  in Botcherby Carlisle. Riverside boasts in that newspaper that it is “transforming lives”.

The letter says:

No surprise in your Christmas charitable headline:”Hardship on estate deepens amid low pay and rising debt”( Cumberland News December 20).

Your story highlights the plight of families on Botcherby estate in Carlisle who are becoming increasingly hard-pressed... one in five of them have incomes of less than £200 a week. They struggle to pay even food and energy bills, never mind Christmas.

So no surprise then about the charitable headline. But a great deal of surprise that one big increasing bill  facing the struggling families never got a mention in the  story underneath the headline.

That one big increasing bill is for rent. Rent bills have rocketed this year in Botcherby and on  the other Carlisle estates. The increase in rent bills is 30 per cent more in Carlisle than in a similar- size Cumbria town, Barrow, where, unlike Carlisle, social  houses continue to remain in council ownership, according to research by Carlisle Tenants` and Residents`` Federation.

In Carlisle the 6,500 social houses- former council houses- are owned by the giant Liverpool property organisation, Riverside Housing Association which recently reported a 41 per cent  annual surge in its reserves (profits) from £22 million to £32 million.

So Barrow council house rents are very much cheaper than the rents of Riverside`s former Carlisle council houses. And Barrow council house rents are even cheaper than that when Riverside`s “extras” are added to the comparison.

Riverside “extras” are the increases in the way Carlisle rents are  now charged... by introducing new “services” for tenants.

These “services” take the form of new cleaning charges. There are also new charges for door entry systems, for fire alarms, for emergency lighting, for electricity, and for what Riverside`s claims is its “high quality” administration.

These  new charges add about £10 (12 per cent)  to a typical Riverside  rent of £84 .

Carlisle Tenants and Residents` Federation has campaigned for many months against Riverside`s rocketing rents and these extra charges.

About these rents and charges and about the struggling Botcherby families, the Federation  has this comment:

“Riverside boasts every week  that it is transforming lives. For two years it has run an advertisement in the Cumberland News saying  that it is doing just that. The advertisement reads:

“ ` Riverside...transforming lives... revitalising neighbourhoods`

“Riverside`s rocketing rents and extra charges were certainly helping to transform the lives of the struggling people of Botcherby this Christmas.

“The transformation in Botcherby lives is also  highlighted in the headline(above) on another page  of the Cumberland News:`Hardship on estate deepens amid low pay and rising debt.`

“Was this the transformation that the Riverside advertisement is boasting about?”

Community Voice Carlisle is the blog of CarlisleTenants` and Residents` Federation.  Information about the Federation is contained in the first post of  this blog, dated March 25 2015

MR BUTTERWORTH AND THE SHEFFIELD SHUFFLE

PRESS STATEMENT

Dean Butterworth...new man at the top

New Riverside

boss and links to 

return-to-council-control city

With the national housing crisis getting deeper, questions are now being asked in Carlisle about whether the city`s biggest landlord, Riverside, under its new boss is up the job of tackling  problems in the city.

Could the answer be a return to council ownership of Riverside`s  6.500  former council houses, particularly as the new boss, Mr. Dean Butterworth has a Sheffield background associated with  a similar return to council control ?

Mr Malcolm Craik of Brampton who was a member of the Riverside board that took over Carlisle`s  council houses eleven years ago now questions Riverside ability to tackle the  housing crisis and solve its own long-standing problems.

In a letter to the Editor of the Cumberland News, Carlisle, Mr Craik addresses   his  questions  to Mr Dean Butterworth who took over  as Riverside`s Carlisle regional director a few  weeks ago.

 Mr Craik`s letter says:

”Tenants and leaseholders will be watching with more than a little interest to see how Mr Butterworth performs in his new role.

“Riverside’s rents in Carlisle are around 30% higher than those in Barrow in Furness, which retained its council housing, and the organisation’s former City Council leaseholders are still in dispute with Riverside over the terms of their leases and new service charges.

“Homelessness continues to be a major issue in Carlisle while at the same time Riverside claims that it can’t let three bedroomed homes because of the bedroom tax. All are serious issues that require urgent resolution.

“Mr Butterworth says his team is committed to improving customer services and satisfaction, delivering a consistent service to all Riverside’s customers. His customers will have to hope that he can deliver what he has promised.

“I understand that he was formerly an Assistant Director of council housing services at Sheffield Homes, an Arm’s Length Management Organisation set up by Sheffield City Council in 2004 to manage its 42,000 council properties.

“ In February 2012 tenants voted to return their properties to Council control with 88% voting in favour of the move. Sheffield will manage its own homes again from April 2014.”

“I wonder if Mr Butterworth will want to canvass the views of Carlisle tenants to see how many would like their tenancies to return to City Council control should that option become open in the future.”

Issued by Carlisle Tenants` and Residents` Federation

December 10 2012.

COMMUNITY VOICE CARLISLE is the blog of CarlisleTenants` and Residents` Federation. Information about the Federation is  available in the first blog, dated March 25 2013

PRIVATISATION CASH VALUE...OR PEOPLE SUPPORT VALUE?

HOUSES FOR SALE

AND A COMMUNITY

SOLD OUT

Selling off a couple of former council houses is no big deal for  a giant housing organisation owning more than 50,000 homes.

But for neighbouring homes in Botcherby Avenue Carlisle and for other homes  in the Botcherby area  of the city,  the sale means the loss of two valuable community assets.

Number Two Botcherby Avenue

The two houses-numbers two and nine Botcherby Avenue-  have for  many years  been used as community meeting places and centres of a  council-run healthy living initiative.

One of the houses- number 2 Botcherby Avenue- has been a community meeting place for about half a century, many years before  the healthy living initiative. It was known then as BRAG House.

When the healthy living initiative closed a few months ago the Liverpool-based Riverside Housing Association put the houses up for sale.

Number Nine Botcherby Avenue

The community group, Carlisle Tenants` and Residents` Federation is very concerned about Riverside`s sale decision, depriving Botcherby   of  long- established community facilities. The area is already very short of places for community groups to meet.

The Federation campaigned a few months ago about  Riverside in neighbouring Petteril Bank depriving the community there of similar facilities in Welsh Road.

The Federation is also very concerned about the Riverside sale for another reason- the loss  to the Botcherby community of what  were once two  social houses.

A Federation spokesman said:“Riverside should never have closed these two Botcherby Avenue  houses in the first place.

Coun. Betton....more social housing

“But having closed them, Riverside had a duty to the community to keep them as social houses for rent to hard up local people or to people who don`t want to buy a house - That is what they were built for by the city council.

“These days people often struggle to pay food bills, never mind  finding £100,000 for a house or even a deposit for a mortgage,” said a Federation spokesman.

The Federation view is shared by Botcherby councillor Robert Betton who continues to campaign for more social houses for rent. More than 400 Botcherby people signed his recent petition supporting social housing.”The people of Botcherby want  social housing”, he says.

The Federation will continue to campaign against Riverside`s policy of privatisation  and sale of the city `s 6500  former council houses which it took over ten years ago.”The Riverside organisation is neither properly accountable nor transparent in its dealings. It has questions to answer but will not answer them,”  said a Federation spokesman.

Community Voice Carlisle is the blog of Carlisle Tenants` and Residents` Federation. Information about the Federation is contained in the first post of this blog, dated March 25 2013.

MILIBAND SHOULD NOW TACKLE HOUSING ASSOCIATIONS

Ed Miliband....housing associations next?

BLOATED `PROFITS` AT
EXPENSE OF THE POOREST IN SOCIETY 

Ed Miliband should now take a look at the latest bloated figures for housing associations following his latest attack on the energy companies...“exorbitant  prices for exorbitant profits”, was his description  at yesterday`s Commons Question Time.

Profits of the Big Six  energy companies have  leapt more than sixfold a household to £53 a household from £8 a household  four years ago. The average household bill rose  £168 last year with £23 of  that rise going to greater profits, according to the regulator Ofgem

The story is much the same in the housing association sector where last year  there were soaring surpluses (profits) for Britain`s biggest  associations.

 Surpluses at the 30  biggest associations  soared to almost £1 billion according to research by the influential housing industry publication, Inside Housing.

The total surpluses for the 30 biggest in the last financial year stood at £947.1 million, a 60 per cent increase  on the previous year`s total of £592. 5 million.

An association   with one of the biggest increases- fifty percent- is the Liverpool based Riverside which owns all of Carlisle`s 6,500 former council houses. Its surplus now stands at £32.8 million.

The surplus comes as no surprise to Carlisle Tenants` and Residents` Federation which has long argued that Riverside is generating profits (not surpluses)-saving money for itself to sustain its business at the expense  of some of the poorest people.

Mr Miliband`s description of energy companies`” exorbitant prices for exorbitant profits”  can equally be applied to housing associations.

Now Mr Miliband should be asking why these associations, claiming to be  not-for-profit organisations, should be creating these excessive surpluses.

Why are rents increasing-including those in Carlisle- above the rate of inflation when there is so much profit?

 And why should these associations expect government subsidies when internal  reserves are so high?

A Federation spokesman said:”These profits are disgraceful. If these housing associations were spending money on new social housing there would be no surpluses.

”Alternatively, give tenants a rebate to help with soaring energy bills and living costs.”

Community Voice Carlisle is the blog of Carlisle Tenants and Residents` Federation. Information about the Federation is available on the first post of this blog, dated March 25 2013.

HOUSING ASSOCIATIONS..."THEIR ROLE CAN BE POSITIVELY HARMFUL"

HUGE POWERS

WITH NO

ACCOUNTABILITY

A lot of criticism has been levelled at housing associations and the way they do things... secrecy and lack of accountability, particularly.

Now, housing associations are accused of being positively harmful.

Jon Zigmond

Mr.Jon Zigmond,  a partner for many years in one of the top international firms of auditors makes this accusation in a letter to the Financial Times.

Mr Zigmond,  now retired, says that housing associations should not  now have any greater role than others in the push for more housing. They  already benefit from cheap money, he says. He goes on:

“Housing associations exhibit mixed behaviour. Unlike elected local councils which know their decisions will be considered by voters at regular intervals, the boards of housing associations have no accountability.

”They face no competition and have huge powers to decide who should  and who should not have the very selective benefit of cheaper rents.

“With a limited supply of houses it is important that what is built is what is needed. The housing market provides that. A decision by an unelected body does not.

“ And with a limited supply of housing, designating some housing as social simply increases the cost of free market housing. So the chosen few receive a very valuable benefit to the detriment of others, not chosen but who are otherwise in almost the same position.”

This sort of thing has been said for years by the community group, Carlisle Tenants` and Residents Federation. Admittedly,  the Federation never put the case in such a scholarly fashion as Mr Zigmond.

But what he has to say  in the broad field of national housing is equally true on the housing estates of Carlisle where the unfair policies of  the giant Riverside Housing Association are well entrenched.

No competition, huge powers and  no accountability are  the main features of those policies. As  for the chosen few referred to by Mr. Zigmond, the Federation has fought for years  against another chosen few,  those who benefit from Riverside`s grossly unfair policy of help for some community groups and no help for others.

This fight will continue until Riverside respects all communities-not just the favourites- and starts to fall in line with the present government`s localism legislation

Mr Zigmond`s home is in the village of Rosedale Abbey, North Yorkshire. He was 34 years with PricewaterhouseCoopers, one of the world`s Big Four auditors.

Community Voice Carlisle is the blog of Carlisle Tenants` and Residents` Federation. Information about the Federation is contained in the first post of the blog, dated March 25 2013.

SOCIAL HOUSING SHOULD RETURN TO CIVIC OWNERSHIP

Press statement

JUMPS IN RIVERSIDE

BILLS ECHO  ENERGY

RIP-OFFS,

SAY TENANTS

There are echoes  of the continuing row over rocketing energy bills and the excessive pay awards for bosses in the charges to tenants of Riverside Housing Association, it is claimed today.

The community group, Carlisle Tenants` and Residents`Federation says that Riverside bills in Carlisle this year have increased thirty per cent more than increases in similar houses which remain in council ownership.

.

The Federation also draws attention to the Riverside annual accounts which reveal that David Jepson,  Riverside`s deputy chief  executive, had a total income last year of £393,000 which is 120 per cent more than the Riverside chief executive, Carol Matthews.

The total income of Ms Matthews is  several thousand pounds more than the Prime Minister.

Mr Jepson`s last year`s income is part of a redundancy package which included a payment in lieu of  notice " for business reasons", according to the accounts.

The influential housing magazine, Inside Housing, commenting on the accounts, says that only a month after Mr Jepson`s redundancy payment, he became interim chief executive at another big housing association, the 13,000 home Regenda Group. The salary was not disclosed.

A Federation spokesman said:”Such massive pay offs are not new to Riverside. Nor are massive jumps in the rents of Riverside tenants. In Cumbria this year, Riverside bills for rents  rose 30 per cent more over twelve months than rents in similar  social houses which remain in council ownership  in  Barrow, a town similar to Carlisle.”

The 30 per cent difference was revealed following an investigation by the Federation.

Fairer bills for  all householders is what the critics  now demand from the big six energy companies, together with an end to fat cat pay-offs for the bosses, better competition between companies and better regulation by the Government.

The Federation spokesman added: “The critics of Riverside and other housing associations make exactly the same demands and see a return to civic ownership of  all social housing as the only solution.”

Liverpool-based Riverside owns 55,000 houses nationwide. In Carlisle, it owns 6,000.

Issued by Carlisle Tenants` and Residents` Federation.

November 14 2013

BERLIN HAS THE ANSWER TO ENERGY PRICE RIP-OFFS

BRING BACK 
CIVIC
OWNERSHIP 
IN BRITAIN TOO

There are a lot of miles between here and Berlin but not much distance between something they have in common-  the broken energy markets of the six big energy companies here in Britain and  similar failures by energy companies in Berlin.

The German companies which have failed may  now be re-nationalised.

A referendum  on re-nationalisation has just been held in Berlin following a  similar decision by the second German  city, Hamburg, which has now returned its city grid to civic ownership.

Here in Carlisle there have been similar thoughts of a return to civic ownership, but this time of the city`s 6,500 former council houses, now owned by the largely unaccountable Riverside Housing Association of Liverpool which has 55,000 homes nationwide.

Riverside has just revealed that David Jepson (left) its deputy chief  executive had a total income last year of £393,000 which is 120 per cent more than the Riverside chief executive, Carol Matthews.The total income of Ms Matthews is  several thousand pounds more than the Prime Minister.

Mr Jepson`s last year`s income is part of a redundancy package which included a payment in lieu of  notice " for business reasons", reports the  business magazine, Inside Housing.

The magazine says that only a month after his redundancy, Mr Jepson became interim chief executive at another big housing association, the 13,000 home Regenda Group. The salary was not disclosed.

Such massive pay offs are not new to Riverside. Nor are massive jumps in the rents of Riverside tenants. In Cumbria this year, Riverside bills for rents in Carlisle rose 30 per cent more over twelve months than rents in  social houses  in the similar town of Barrow which remain in council ownership.

The 30 per cent difference was revealed following an investigation by Carlisle Tenants` and Residents` Federation.

Fairer bills for  all householders is what the critics  now demand from the big  six energy companies, together with an end to fat cat pay-offs for the bosses, better competition between companies and better regulation by the Government.

In Berlin and Hamburg there were similar demands of the companies until it was decided that a return to civic ownership was the only solution to the broken market there.

The critics of Riverside and other housing associations make the same demands and see a return to civic ownership as the only solution to fat cat pay-offs, rising household bills, lack of competitiveness and poor regulation by the government.

Community Voice Carlisle is the blog of Carlisle Tenants` and Residents` Federation. Information about the Federation is available on the first post of the blog, dated March 25.