Tag Archives: council estate

Regeneration in Lock-down

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Up until 20 working days ago, we wondered how we would manage to speak to so many people about so many projects and ensure that at least 7 projects would get through the ballot and planning processes this year.

With some of our clients, this push took on a life of its own driven by balancing lots of proects,  staff and venue availability and stretching everybody’s resources to the limit. Our last public event took place on the second Thursday in March and it was clear the next day,  when the football season was suspended due to risks presented the Covid-19 virus, that our industry would need to think again.

We have shifted to virtual consultation and communications;  taken our computers home and rationalised what can be done without resident input. The truth is not very much can, and I am sure that other partners in our projects are realising just how pivotal gaining the the trust and belief of residents is. Nothing can proceed to ballot or planning applications without residents seeing, hearing,  touching plans. A timely reminder of where the power should rest, within the community.

Communities need to be supported to adapt to the new normal; to put themselves and their loved ones first; and lost of all forget the worry that regeneration brings with it as well as the advantages. Whilst we can’t meet face-to-face we are keen to keep in touch and alleviate any worries people may have. Even if you are feeling stir-crazy and just want a chat, give us a call or drop an e-mail.

We have made is a list of resources for families cooped-up at home and wanting a way to keep brains going Lockdown links Feel free to ask for a copy and share this widely we all need all the help we can get. The advice from an experienced home educator is to choose just one or two activities each day plus the PE class if your family is not active otherwise (walking / cycling / playing outside), rather than attempt a home education. If nothing else, it limits screen time. If we come across more we will send them on.

We really hope you all keep healthy and well and that we see you all at a community event before too long.

Our Best Wishes

Carol Rob & the Team

Social housing should not be viewed as ‘second class’ or an experiment

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I was at a workshop on building new homes and we got to a contentious point about what was being planned.  I asked the room  (mainly architects and regenerators) if they would take the same action / design they were planning if this was not social housing. There was silence in response because most recognised the likely answer was no. I then asked if they personally would live next door to or above the facility they were planning and again the answer was silence.

Why oh why do Councils and Housing providers still persist in designing things into new social housing and estates that they would not dream of placing on a ‘private’ estates? The answer clearly comes down the fact that this would result in  a reduction in sale price whereas it is not seen as an issue in social housing. All too often there is still this unconscious perception that it does not matter with social housing because ‘they’ don’t own the property.

I grew up on a council estate and am all too familiar with the snobbery and patronising behaviour that can be directed at social housing. Anybody who knows me will be aware of my complete antipathy for murals and mosaics which were the universal panacea for all ‘deprivation’ ills between the 1970’s and 1990’s. ‘These poor people are deprived, lets give them a mural (and let them eat cake too)’. Don’t get me wrong I am big supporter of public art, but I’m talking quality and well thought out work, not something  bad that marks you out as a ‘deprived’ area. How many murals and mosaics do you see on new ‘private’ estates …mmm… none! I like graffiti and a nice Gaudi mosaic but not as a marker  and I mean you too Banksy.

All too often on mixed new build estates I hear the term ‘tenure blind’ but it never is, the quality of the work surfaces, tiles and finishes is always just that bit cheaper in the social units.

A few things to consider:

  • Rent covers all costs in the same way as a mortgage does so stop treating different tenures differently
  • If it is not alright where you live why do you think it will be alright in ‘social housing’
  • By putting a different financial value on social housing you are also putting a lower social value

Tackling the Stigma Felt by Residents

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The Government’s Green Paper on Social Housing came out promising four main items. One of the main items was to tackle “the stigma felt by residents”, to which the paper proposed the solution of “celebrating thriving communities”. And yet, two key questions that the green paper failed to address were “what is the stigma” and “what divides are there within estates and  communities?”

Many regeneration projects involve creating new private blocks to be sold on the estates in order to pay for “new and improved” social housing. When talking to residents on a soon to be regenerated estate in Camberwell, I heard that one of their biggest concerns was the potential divide between the new block of private and the old close-knit community. Whether finishes would be completed to the same standard; whether they would be locked out of communal facilities aligned with private block as they’d seen in other estates; whether they’d be made to feel lesser by those living on the same plot of land that they had currently inhabited exclusively . The residents were sure this would exist, the so-called poor doors.

When presented with initial plans, some residents went so far as to measure the split of open space overlooked by blocks for existing tenants and blocks for potential private owners. They found inequalities and stigma.

If this is what “stigma” is, then it comes as no surprise, evident differences in the standard of living due to the difference of social and private housing which occurs even within the same estate. But how have we found ourselves at this point, where people expect this level of blatant stigma? I’m a linguistics student, so I cannot help but be drawn to the language. The terms “council housing”, “social housing”, “council housing residents”. Compare to other countries such as Singapore where “government built” housing is abundant and sought after, their “public housing” and its residents are not termed under “council” or “social”. Instead the acronym HDB (housing development board) is used. And the people? Just residents. They are residents of Singapore who live in their homes.

The very policy of determining residents of council and social housing as that seeks to establish their identity according to their place in society. They are not homeowners. They are tenants of the council, the society. When we seek to establish who a person is according to where they live, how can stigma help but exist?

So, if the stigma can be felt and perceived by residents in their own homes and then physically seen in the differences between private and social in their estates or within how housing associations treat the divide, then the problem with stigma does not exist solely within the public’s perception but rather within the estates themselves. We have ingrained stigma through language and so many other policies into the very people that are meant to be helped. And to now differentiate between the “thriving communities” and the communities that are struggling as a solution only isolates the latter. It may help public perception, but does it actually help the residents?

Some small things for consideration:

  • Insist that architects propose tenure blind designs and finishes on all projects. (This should be a given).
  • Share the amenity space equally between tenure types and avoid gating or segregating
  • More housing association and council led inclusive events to bring the communities together. Or at least research on “thriving” communities to see what may help mend broken communities.
  • Most importantly: Not further isolating struggling and stigmatized communities as a solution for stigma.

More than one kind of capital

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Sheffield Hallam, CIH and Poplar Harca have produced a report that is trying to strongly make the case for housing led regeneration. It is very much worded in a way that is about the financial model/economic benefit mode. It is a case that is needed because we are talking to a government who needs to understand the economic reason for anything.

This all got me thinking about the need to bring some of the focus back to the other capital, the people and how they can really deliver a return on investment.

Let me come clean, I worked for Harca on the community investment side when it was still new, which why I started thinking about this. Harca was quite unique in its set up (last century) in its avowed intent to place people and community at its heart as part of who it was and how it operated. It had a population where more than 50% was economically inactive and its property stared the lovely shining island of canary wharf in the face.

My job was to recruit a group of 20 (it crept up because I’m bad at saying no) and train them to set up advice services to run within the series of community hubs that Harca created. I spent 3 months training with the most fabulous, creative, amusing and occasionally infuriating group of people. At the start of the journey I did not know that my real aim was not to turn them into advice workers but to make sure that what they saw as success at the start was completely changed by the end of my time with me. More important was that they could actually achieve what THEY wanted.

For the first month, I was slightly bemused to discover that 80% of my groups’ only wish was to become housing officers, having done this role (no disrespect to good HOs) I was surprised by this being the pinnacle of desire. It wasn’t just about pay it was about ‘respect’.

Having grown up on a ‘bad’ council estate (any good ones in the press?), I recognised what I came to call the poverty of aspiration, I’d seen it at home when I wanted not to go into trade but to go to college (shock horror). I’d also seen it in South London running a placement scheme where the only job anyone wanted to do was social work. This kind of constraint can really hold communities back, you can only have so many housing officers, social workers or in my own case steel workers.

What the willingness to invest in social capital did was give a lot of unforeseen returns. The group achieved their primary aim and delivered local advice services, in particular services that helped hundreds of residents maximise benefits and supported many of them into work. It had the knock of effects of setting up a ‘hit’ outreach team that was also used by neighbouring landlords and health services. Most importantly, it allowed the group to diversify. The original 20 + went on to work for private contractors, the health service, running a call centre, setting up their own business and some went to university. They brought more diversity into the local community and crucially higher paid roles.

Last time I checked in at least one of them was still delivering benefits advice on the estates albeit now at such professional level they should be training other advisors. That is the next step….