Housing

New Right to Manage regulations for local authority tenants

Communities and Local Government is introducing new initiatives to encourage and support tenant management.

New Right to Manage regulations for local authority tenants will be introduced on 1 October 2008. The key changes are:

  • the feasibility and the development stages will be combined and will be carried out within 15 months - unless the tenants' group and local authority agree to a longer period
  • no ballot will be required at the end of the feasibility stage before going onto the development stage as the two stages have been merged
  • the competence assessment will be carried out by an independent Approved Assessor rather than the person or agency supporting tenants
  • the local authority will have to complete an offer to tenants within three months of the independent assessment rather than providing a summary of proposals to all tenants within two months of the Approved Person's report
  • the local authority has three months to carry out a ballot. Proposals have to have the approval of the majority of tenants, and the majority of secure tenants voting - not of those living in the area as under the current regulations
  • the ballot will take place when the proposals are known - work on the detail of the management agreement may take place after the ballot. Therefore the local authority must enter into a management agreement within nine months of the ballot rather than two months under the current regulations

Communities and Local Government will promote a voluntary tenant management route for all social housing landlords and tenants.  New guidance will be available in October for both the statutory and voluntary routes.

There will also be changes to the Tenant Empowerment Programme which is administered on our behalf by the Housing Corporation:

  • grant will be available to support housing association tenants exploring and developing tenant management
  • grants will support Lead Advisors, rather than Approved Persons
  • grant to support tenants management development will be based on an assessment of the groups' needs from an Approved Assessor
  • we are developing a new Approved Assessor Service

Further information can be found on the Right to Manage home page of this website. The InSTEP website at: www.instepservices.co.uk (external link) is another useful reference. Their telephone number is (Freephone) 0500 844 111.

Guidance on how to apply for grant funding from the Tenant Empowerment Programme is administered by the Housing Corporation and will be revised to reflect the changes operational from 1 October 2008.  

Advice and Guidance is also available from: www.housingcorp.gov.uk (external link)  or the Tenant Empowerment administrator, email: tenantempowerment@housingcorp.gsx.gov.uk .

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