Decent Homes by 2012?

I have recently seen the letter sent from the Sutton Housing Partnership in which they sensibly give tenants and leaseholders advance information that as a result of initial inspection weaknesses they are pushing back their formal inspection, which will decide how much money they get from the Government.

This seems sensible to me for the following two reasons:

1. As I predicted at Housing SCAG 6 months ago, Secretary of State Ruth Kelly in a recent speech signaled that the pressure on all authorities to achieve Decent Homes Standard by 2010 had been released and exceptions would be allowed.

2. It is better for the ALMO to get its house (so to speak) in order before the inspection that determines how much of its £136 million bid it gets.

I recently sat in at the last SHP Board meeting and it seemed very focussed on the need to improve weaker areas in the coming year or so.

I also welcome the fact that SHP is now represented on the wider Sutton Partnership as it is one of the 4 largest partners (along with Health bodies and the Police) so deserves representation. At some stage I will write up some further thoughts on the Policy4Sutton website.