Social housing regulatory reforms

Charter for social housing residents

The Social Housing White Paper, published in November 2020, outlines what social housing residents should expect from their landlords. It seeks to rebalance the relationship between residents and landlords and enable residents to hold their landlord to account and understand how they are performing.

The Social Housing White Paper sets out the action the government will take to ensure that residents in Social Housing are safe, are listened to, live in good quality homes and have access to redress when things go wrong.

At the heart of the white paper is the Charter for Social Housing Residents. The charter sets out 7 commitments:

  • to be safe in your home
  • to know how your landlord is performing, including on repairs, complaints and safety, and how it spends its money
  • to have your complaints dealt with promptly and fairly, with access to a strong ombudsman
  • to be treated with respect, backed by a strong consumer regulator and improved consumer standards for tenants
  • to have your voice heard by your landlord
  • to have a good quality home and neighbourhood to live in, with your landlord keeping your home in good repair
  • the government will ensure social housing can support people to take their first step to ownership

Read more about the Social Housing White Paper on GOV.UK.

Health and safety lead

James Yeomans

The Social Housing (Regulation) Act 2023 requires registered providers of social housing to have a named lead to ensure the health and safety of residents of social housing.

We are pleased to share that our health and safety lead for social housing is James Yeomans, Head of Housing Property.

The role

The health and safety lead is responsible for:

  • monitoring our compliance of health and safety requirements
  • assessing the risks of failing to comply with health and safety requirements
  • notifying our Executive of those risks, any failure to comply with health and safety requirements and advice on how those risks and failure should be dealt with

These responsibilities are in relation to the properties that are owned and managed by our Housing Service. The health and safety lead is not personally responsible for our compliance with health and safety and building safety, nor liable for any failure to comply with the regulations.

Find out more about the relevant legislation.

If you are our tenant, licensee or leaseholder and would like to contact our health and safety lead for information on how we comply with our health and safety requirements, please email: housinginfo@centralbedfordshire.gov.uk.

Find out how to report a repair.

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