RBWM pledges £520,000 to fix housing service ‘on its knees’.

Royal Borough councillors approved plans to use £520,000 to improve a housing service that is ‘on its knees’.

The money will come from capital receipts, which are generated when the council sells assets such as properties or land. Other funding will also be made available from grants.

At a cabinet meeting on Tuesday (November 25), Councillor Catherine Del Campo (Lib Dem, Furze Platt), cabinet member for housing services, introduced plans to hire new staff and invest more money into temporary accommodation.

Around £800,000 each year will be put towards hiring 15 employees needed to improve homelessness prevention in the borough.

Cllr Del Campo said: “We did inherit a difficult situation when we took control of the council. We were missing key posts, outdated or missing policies and strategies.

“Despite the sterling efforts of the small team of officers who were on board at the time, residents felt unheard and unsupported at the most vulnerable point in their lives.

“The ship is starting to turn. We still have a way to go though, and on top of financial pressures there is also a very human cost when you have a housing service that is on its knees. That’s why we need to go even further and be even more ambitious going forward.”

She added that for every household kept out of temporary accommodation, the council saves around £23.5k a year.

Cllr Lynne Jones (Ind, Old Windsor) said: “It became obvious that the housing department had been reduced to a level that was given little to no resource to enable us to do our statutory duties.

“[This investment] will give better services to residents and enable us to look more towards prevention rather than paying through the nose.”

But Cllr Helen Price (Ind, Clewer and Dedworth East), who addressed the cabinet from the public gallery, raised concerns around the time it will take to manage all these new employees.

Cllr Price said: “When you employ an additional 15 people, that’s an enormous amount to assimilate and that in itself takes management time.”

Cllr Del Campo agreed that this will be a ‘significant reorganisation’ for housing services.

But she added: “There will no doubt be an impact on existing staff in terms of onboarding and training, but it needs to be done, and we need to get on with it.”

As part of the council’s housing services transformation plan, a Local Authority Housing Fund (LAHF) from the Government is available to help the Royal Borough purchase more temporary accommodation.

Councillors agreed to buy eight homes using the fund, including four two-bed, three three-bed and a one-bedroom home.

A housing association provider will be used to leverage the funding. These properties will be leased for 10 years as temporary accommodation.

Cllr Del Campo said: “It’s not just about reducing our spend, but it’s about families at an incredibly vulnerable point in their lives being able to stay in the borough close to their networks, their schools, their jobs.”

The Royal Borough had to return any leftover LAHF funding that the previous administration did not use.

Cllr Del Campo added: “The conditions for each round of funding are different. But I also think it’s fair to say that there was no real appetite in the previous administration to deliver temporary accommodation or affordable social housing.”