Manchester City Council launches social housing review

Manchester City Council has announced a major review into how local authority-owned social housing is managed in the city.

The local authority said the review will look at management standards of the council-owned properties, value for money to the council for the service received, and will also ask for input from residents.

Council-owned social housing in the city is predominantly managed by Northwards Housing – an arm’s length management organisation (ALMO) – which looks after around 13,000 local authority homes in the city.

Tenants will play a crucial role, providing insight from the people living in Northwards properties to fully appreciate their lived experience and to gain insight around how they feel their home is looked after, and what their vision for the future is.

Fundamentally, the exercise will ascertain the most appropriate option for how council-owned social housing is managed in the future, with the current preferred option – subject to consultation – to bring management of these homes back in-house.

The review is also in the context of significant changes within the social housing sector, not least the way social housing finance is managed through the Housing Revenue Account (HRA) system.

‘We want Manchester residents to benefit from high quality, well-managed social housing,’ said executive member for housing and regeneration, Cllr Suzanne Richard. ‘The most recent review of the council’s ALMO (arm’s length management organisation) was in 2016 and it is now timely that we do so again.

‘Zero carbon retrofit, further fire safety investment and the need for continued investment in our existing homes brings with it huge financial challenges. It’s therefore right we should take the time to reflect on the challenges ahead and the best way to meet these.

‘We cannot do this without the help of council tenants. Alongside our refresh of the Our Manchester strategy over the weeks ahead, it’s important that we also get the views of Northwards’ tenants about what it is like to live in a Northwards home and what changes they want to see in the future.’

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