Transcript

I'm going to start the meeting. Thank you. Good evening and welcome to the Housing and Regeneration Scrutiny Sub-Committee meeting. My name is Councillor Bodru Chaudhry and I will be chairing the meeting tonight. This meeting has been held in person with the Housing and Regeneration Scrutiny Sub-Committee members along with key participants present in the meeting room, while others are joining us remotely. Only the sub-committee members present in the meeting can vote. Should a technical error occur that prevents remote attendees from participating, I will decide if and how the meeting should proceed after taking advice from officers. This meeting has been filmed for the Council's website, the public viewing. Those participating in the meeting will be included in the footage. I will remind members of the meeting to only speak on my direction and not to engage and speak clearly into their microphones to ensure that their contributions can be properly recorded. Those who are in the meeting room physically must use their microphone and must turn off when not speaking kindly. Thank you. Can you all please have your mobile off or on silent mode, thank you. Can virtual participants keep microphones on mute except when you are speaking, thank you. With the exception of scrutiny members, only turn on your video cameras when speaking to the safe bandwidth. Scrutiny members are encouraged to keep video cameras turned on and if members and officers joining remotely wish to speak, please use the raise hand function. Please do not use the remote meeting chat function as it will not be seen by those of us in the meeting in the chamber. We will go on to apologies for absence. Justina, do you have any apologies for absence that you have received? Yes, Chair. I have been informed that Susanna Cowell is away so she has sent her apologies and Councillor James King has sent his apologies but we have Councillor Mark Francis in his place. Chair, can I also just note that the Director of Housing Paul Patterson was due to attend but unfortunately because of a personal emergency he has been called away at short notice. Thank you, Justina. Thank you Paul for the update. I hope his family is well. We can only pray and wish him good wishes. Can members introduce yourself followed by a declaration of whether you have any DCI to declare declaration of discolourable pecuniary interest. Do we have any from any members? Yes, Chair. Councillor Amin. How are you doing? My name is Councillor Amin. I sit on the THCH board. Thank you. Thank you, Councillor. Justina, if that could be noted please. Thank you. Now we will go on to our appointment of Vice Chair. The next item is to appoint the Vice Chair. Justina will be reporting on this item. Justina, thank you. Thanks, Chair. This is an annual report basically giving the terms of membership for the new municipal year 2024-25, the quorum, the meeting, the membership and those are for noting. But I'm here this evening to ask members if the start time of 6.30 is acceptable for you. To the members, yes. Everyone agreed. Thank you, Justina. Thank you. So now we will go and appoint the Vice Chair for the committee for the next year ahead. Do we have any nominees? Thank you. Councillor. Yes, Councillor. I would like to propose Councillor Amin Rahman for the Vice Chair. Thank you, Councillor. Do we have a second? Yes, I'm second. Thank you, Councillor. Do we have any other nominations? No. Justina. Councillor Amin Rahman was proposed by Councillor Kabir and seconded by Councillor Amin. Thanks, Chair. I'll make sure that's noted. So we have Vice Chair, Councillor Amin Rahman is the Vice Chair of this committee. Thank you very much. Thank you. We move to the next item. The next item is to agree the terms of reference, membership, quorum and dates of the meetings for 2024-25. Justina will report on this item. Thank you. Sorry, Chair. I thought we just went through this. Oh, the T&C, terms of reference. Yes, the terms of reference, all of that's done. Okay, not to worry. Sorry. Now we'll go to the next item on our housing and regenerative terms of reference. I'm sorry. Minister of the previous meeting. So it's my first evening, so those who are here in the last committee, do you have anything that you would like to share with us for the minutes arising? No, nothing to declare? Babu? You know, last week at the overview of scrutiny, the CEO mentioned the frequency of meetings. And is that the increase in the frequency of meetings? And I guess that's going to be reflected in the terms and condition, and if so, when? And number one. Number two, I think, yeah, page 18 talks about health and adult subcommittee, which is not directly relevant. So page 18, 5.1. So maybe it's just a typo issue. Thank you. That has been noted. Do you want to answer that? In terms of the number of meetings, I think what was suggested at last week's scrutiny work program meeting from the chief executive was a proposal to be put to the overview and scrutiny committees, the various subcommittees and the overview and scrutiny committee. So when we know what the final outcome is in terms of what scrutiny will look like and an implementation date, we'll be able to address that at that point. Currently we're just progressing on the basis that scrutiny is set up in the way that we had described as was described in the terms and conditions that was outlined. But as and when those change, we'll be able to adapt those. There's certainly plenty of items that we can add on to extra meetings if need be. Thank you, Paul, for the update. Babu, I hope he answers your questions you've raised. One more. Page 22, 23. At the previous scrutiny we had residents from THCH who came and shared their experiences. And I think we're talking about bringing in RPs to come in and answer specific questions about data and performance. And I think it would probably make sense to get THCH's management to come in one of the following scrutinies about their performance and data and performance would make sense. Sorry. Can I just clarify that Paul will be talking through that in the next item? Thank you. We'll move on. Councillor Francis. Thank you, Chair. So there's a result here about writing, sorry, the committee asked the Mayor to initiate a formal request to meet with the Minister for Housing, the Regulator for Social Housing and our local MPs to investigate THCH's performance. Is that an action from the last meeting? Okay, so we'll be feeding back on that on the next item as well. Brilliant. Thank you. Just to clear something, the Minister of the last meeting, is it okay with everyone? Okay, thank you. Thanks for that. Move on to our next item, Outstanding Actions. Yes, Justin. For you. Sorry, Paul will say thank you, Paul. To you, thank you. Thank you, Chair. Yes, the Outstanding Actions item log was circulated to members at the weekend along with a response we'd had to close off one of the items. So I have no changes to those. They're based on anything more than what was circulated at the weekend. The issue that Councillor Francis referred to has not yet been replied to. There are a couple of longstanding overdue items and at the last committee meeting we were asked to resolve those, so we are working with the Director of Housing and Regent with the expectation that we close off the items by the next committee meeting. That's all I have to report on Outstanding Actions. Sorry, Paul, thanks for that. Thank you. Councillor Francis. Thank you. I'm so sorry because I'm standing in at the last minute. I don't think I was included on that. So just for the record, can we know, has that request been made of the Mayor and if it has, has anything happened to it in the six weeks since the last meeting? The request has been made to the Mayor. We haven't received a response yet. And so we're unaware whether any action has been taken following residents coming and making their representations about the service they were experiencing. Okay. And there was another thing just to follow up on. So I did see that there was a letter that came to us from Town Hamlets Community Housing, refuting some of the allegations that were made and also refuting something that I said as well. So presumably that's not going to be included in the minutes of the meeting. I mean, I thought that they were going to be coming to this meeting, to be honest. I didn't take an interest in it because I wasn't going to be on the committee. But was the invitation extended? My apologies, actually. When I said this item was concluded, that was an omission. I should have said that we did receive that and to say we circulated it. Unfortunately, following discussion with legal services, we've said it cannot be included in the minutes. We have circulated it to Councillors. But we are, as you say, expecting in the new work programme to be inviting THCH early in the new year to come and make a response in person to the allegations and to be able to clarify anything that they feel needs clarifying. But yes, that will be, we'll be calling them in to actually go before this committee very soon. Sorry, just to wrap it up from my perspective at least. So, you know, we've been hearing about THCH's performance for 18 months. Like finally, we got the residents in and some residents, a small group of residents in and heard their experience. And one of my concerns is about the really significant lack of progress on this issue. The Council has an obligation to these residents. And as I understand it, the next meeting isn't scheduled to be until September. It might happen, there might be an extra one in July. You know, I think this needs to be dealt with more urgently. I've said before, I don't have, I only have two THCH tenants in my ward. One of them, I just got a stage two complaint back today, where THCH admitted that they had wrongly tried to charge her, a disabled resident, for the cost of doing works in the drains and the sewers. I mean, this is bonkers. This is completely inappropriate. And it's the sort of thing that needs to be, that they need to, that somebody needs to be cracking down on. And I don't get the sense that anyone in this town hall is cracking down on it.

Thank you, Mark. I think it's been noted. Thank you. We'll move on to our first item of the evening. Review the progress against the ambitious to build a thousand homes a year. We will, our next item on the agenda is to review that. And I now would like to ask Councillor Kabir Ahmed, the committee member, for housing and regeneration, inclusive development. And Karen Swift, is she joining us online? Yes, she is. Thank you very much for housing to present the item. It's over to you, Councillor. Thank you. If I introduce our officers first. So, as you've stated, Karen's up on the screen. She's at the housing conference in Manchester, representing our Hamlets. We've got Sri here, who's also the director of planning and building control. And we've got our officers, Paul Buckingham, Matthew Pullen, and Umbreen. Sorry, Umbreen, I don't know who you're saying. We're here to support us along with Rupa as well. So, I mean, chair, I'm assuming that the pack that was sent is presented as read. And I'll give a briefing overview of that. If that's okay with you, chair? Yes, Councillor. You have five minutes to sum it up. Thank you. Sorry. So, staff in housing and regeneration from planning and building control and housing supply, as well as capital delivery, are all working towards the mayor's target of delivering 4,000 new affordable homes between 2022 and 2026. The presentation updates ONS on progress against that target. It illustrates a challenging economic position, which is making delivery more challenging. It also looks both at the private sector delivery and council led house building, and it explains what we're doing or proposing to do to try and address these challenges. Now, it's important to understand what the data is telling us. Over the last five years, it shows us that there's been a steady trajectory downwards until 2324, when it dipped significantly. If you go to slide 5, it will show you the data gathered by the GLA, delivery against targets of all tenors, has been consistently hard for all boroughs to achieve delivery. In the years 23/24 figures only available for some boroughs, it's very low for all boroughs. And if you see slide 6, for our figures on over, numbers are for 2324 is 1,113. Slide 9 emphasizes that the private development deliveries delivers most affordable homes in the borough, secured by 106 agreement. They're usually on site and part of much larger developments delivered in phases and delivered over many years. Officers are also trying to negotiate affordable housing upfront, but this is not always easy or possible. Council led delivery, we're doing much more control over design and delivery, and often at 100% affordable housing. This can sometimes be challenging for viability, so requires significant subsidy. If we can secure sufficient resources, then this program can be expanded and delivered quicker, in theory, than private sector-led affordable housing. The timing of when that happens is beyond our control. Slide 10, 4,000 affordable homes over four years has 1,000 a year as a delivery target. These figures were not meeting this target. Now, the reality of delivering housing building programs is that you don't get a linear trajectory of each year this is being delivered. So you work on a number of programs and then suddenly it drops 400 units, 300 units, throughout periodically over the sort of four-year period. So we're working towards unlocking a number of schemes in order to get those drops of social housing come, signed off and into the market for people to bid for and rent. There's been a number of programs that we've actively worked on between both the planning team and the housing delivery team. We're also in the phase of going through a restructure in order to get better, a sort of unified working between the teams, in order to expediate both the planning phases as well as the build-out phases as well of a number of programs. I mean, we've got lists of this and offices can go on one by one in relation to the list. I see you, I've got two minutes. Wow, that's excellent. Thank you. So, going back to the focus, I also want to highlight in summary some of the challenges that we're facing. Now, the key challenge is in relation to regulations, particularly the 18-metre rule, where some of our key programs that were going to deliver social housing has had to revert back to planning, because it was done on a 30-metre basis, understanding that the GLA were going to uphold. However, that's reshaped having to reintroduce a second staircase, and that program has also affected a number of other strategic delivery of sites across the borough, but across the country as well, where second staircases now have to be introduced to these programs. And lastly, we're all aware of the market forces that are operating, which includes a 40% inflation rise, where some developers have staggered, and that's where our planning team and our housing delivery team have come in, and we're bringing developers in, in order to see how the council can support them in building out their programs. The last thing I want to say to round off is, again, it goes back to the regulations, a lot of housing providers, RPs, are a tad bit reluctant to go into new programs, particularly as they have huge repairs bills and catch up to play with the sort of big six that have been raised with the housing regulators and a lot of other repair bills. So they're kind of fighting challenges both ways in terms of viability and financing new programs, particularly in joint ventures with developers as well. That's it, Chair. If there is any specifics, I myself and officers here are more than happy to try to answer. Thank you, Councillor, for the overview on this item. Now I will move on to the questions from the members. I will take two questions at a time. So I can see, I'll take Councillor Asma first on my left. Your question, please. Thank you. Thank you, Chair, and I hope there's enough time left over at the end so I can come back again. So my first set of questions is, I know this is a really wide project for a lot of officers and a lot of different departments in the Council, but it also means that when it comes to us, when I look at some of the statistics, I don't know who to point this question out, so I'm going to do it out to all of you, is I think when you're going to talk about challenges, you have to keep the data open for us to be able to really judge these data for what it really is. We've had a change of administration in 2022. I would really have liked to see a lot more digging into the figures of 2015 to 2022. I know you put some in, and I think it's cleverly done because you put 2019 to 2022 in. I think because we've had some challenges during the pandemic, which shows there was a drop and then it picks back up again, for instance, for the affordable units and some of the other units that were completed in the entire Hamlets. But it's good to see how much it slowed down because of the factor. So if you could give me, since 2015, how it's picked up, and you know what, you can even go back to 2010 to 2015 as well if it's helpful, but it's just really good to see how those external factors that you talk about in the report actually did challenge the delivery. I also thought that the figures, when it comes to the last two years, because you've limited us in where you wanted us to look, and I think I want to look wider, and the last two years, where there's data for the affordable homes that have been delivered, I want to know actually, with the offices and the new political wing, how many of them were not pipelined. So how long does it take offices and, for instance, a change of new administration to be able to start adding sites and homes that are going to be built? It's good for us to see that so we can see the picture that's going to emerge in the future. So I'd like the data to really speak to this committee in a way where we can really challenge and really keep you guys on your toes and be able to scrutinise that. And lastly, if you can give a quick update on where we are with the joint venture and how that's helping and how the challenge is impacting that, as well as you talk about four sites that are halted, the one with the 2016 units, which four sites are they, please? Can you give me a bit more detail? Thank you, Councillor, for your question. I'll take one more and you can respond to that, Councillor, thank you. May I have your question, please? Thank you. Again, I've got a number of questions so I'll just limit it for two and then hopefully come back. So page 32 on the... Sorry, if I could just talk one question, please. I'll come back to you after one question, thank you. Yes, that's fine. So page 32 on the slide, it says 2023 to 2024, completed affordable units and it says 459. So that's basically a decrease from the previous year's number of units delivered. And I guess in the following slides, it talks about some of the issues around cost inflation and viability and so on. But that's more kind of a generic narrative and I guess it was a specific narrative about why it was a drop-off. I understand that there are reasons around viability, but I think it would be useful to have that narrative. And also, it says affordable units, but I think affordable is quite broad. It could be social, it could be shared ownership, it could be La London affordable rent and I think that breakdown would also be quite useful to have as well. So yeah, rest of the questions come back afterwards. Thank you. Councillor, over to you and your officers for response. Thank you. So firstly, I think there's been no attempt to kind of have a sleight of hand. We have presented it quite openly and with the challenges that we are facing. And in relation to the specific breakdowns, I'm sure officers will be happy to provide that to you in writing. In terms of sites and homes and how long some of these sites take, well it depends on the size of the site. So for example, if we look at the Royal Docks, the old News International site, I was on SDC when that initial outline planning application was given back in I think 2012. And they're still constructing face by face. The Poplar-Harker application that came for Aberfieldie, again it's a four-phased application. It came, although we rejected it from this council, the GLA has since passed it, but working out the 106 and so on and so forth. So a time of application to deliverables, it could take a decade quite easily for the bigger regeneration programs. For smaller ones it could be two years, four years, five years. It really depends on the complexities of the site. So for example, the Silk Court site, which is just sort of shadowing the town hall on the other side here. There was lots of archaeological remains that were found there, which again stalled the site as well. So viability is on one side, but on the other side it's when they excavate, they find things. There could be a Second World War bomb they suddenly find as an example. So it's difficult to estimate how exactly each site will take. But if you highlight specific sites, I'm sure our officers can give you an update on those sites and what the projected times are in relation for completion for those sites. In relation to the JV, I think Rupert is probably best poised to say that, because I'm not too sure what element of it is confidential and restricted, and what element's not restricted. So I'll let Rupert answer that. In relation to the four sites, I'll let Sri come in on that one. In relation to Mahbub's question of affordable, there's a definition put on there by the GLA definition, but this is against the strategic target that was set in the council's strategic plan. So affordable means affordable with various different products within the definition of affordability. If I can ask Sri to come in on the four sites, and then Rupert if you can speak on the JV, and in relation to the specific data, Paul if you want to come in on that. Thank you, Councillor. Good evening all. I think I can talk about the four sites which we have from the Moliere data. I can come back to you on the four sites, but just to also cover some of the questions you've asked with, Councillor Caprio has picked up on, is very happy to give you the data from what we have from the GLA and other sources from 2010. And with regard to your questions about the last two years, we can also kind of look at that data and look at which bits are new application. So very happy to come back to you with that. And the four sites are, as far as we know, is the Great Eastern Enterprise Centre, which is the South Quay Plaza, is one of them. Second is Poplar Transformation Centre, Gail Street or Watt Street, which is the old swan housing with the crane collapse, the second. The third one is Union Bridge, TSVC building, Hepscott Road, which has 145 units. And the last one is Speyer London, also Hertz May House. These are the ones. Hertz May House, Speyer London, those are the four ones. And if I may, just on to your question, is on the narrative on the wider bits, I think we cover all of those different tenures and we can kind of come back to you with that bit. In terms of the breakdown for the last two years, we can also give you which ones are, you know, what tenure they fall under. The key thing to see here is for the, what you have is 459 as a figure. This is what we currently have in our system. But these building control completion certificates can take a very long time to come through to us, which is why it's important that the next two or three months or even up to six months that officers are really looking at and cleansing the data. So any change in that number we can report back in the next meeting because that's what you would see in the last year. What we reported was at least 90 units more than what was actually completed, just for completeness. Yeah, just to pick up the point about the development agreement sites, that's what you're talking about, isn't it? So we went out to tender in April. We had the tender returns returned a couple of weeks ago and we're now going through the round of the selection questionnaire process. That will inform us as to whether we put people through to a further round, which will be a more detailed evaluation. So we're hoping to report to cabinet by the end of the year with a view to awarding contracts, if we award any, by next February. Thank you. Yeah, so I guess the important role for the council as a planning authority is making sure that we maintain that supply of sites with planning commission. So there's just this at the moment in terms of schemes that are in the planning process at various different stages. There's just under 10,000 homes that could receive planning commission. Some of those are quite an advanced stage, so they've been through committee, for example, and they're waiting for the Section 106 agreements to be completed and then permissions issued. Others are a much earlier stage and heading towards committee. So out of those 10,000, about a quarter of those would be classified as affordable across all tenures, so that includes affordable rent, social rent and intermediate. So in terms of the pipeline supply, then there is a very healthy pipeline that's there. Obviously what we can't do is guarantee that all of those, A, will get permission and B, will go on to be constructed. But I guess that's an important role for the council as a planning authority to make sure that the pipeline keeps continuing. In addition to that, there's also a number of others in the thousands which have stalled for the reasons I've mentioned, the challenges and everything. And there are at least 11 major sites that have stalled and the planning team and the capital delivery team and the housing delivery team, we're all working on it together. So some of it could be that they haven't aligned an RP and are finding it difficult and that's where we're mediating and having discussions, bringing them around the table to join up RPs in order to take that social housing element. And the council is also looking to invest with housing providers and sort of through buy back schemes as well as other, the GLA match funding as well, which we presented previously. Thank you, Councillor, and the officers for the update. Sorry, Councillor. Okay, thank you. I've got it on my list. Councillor, I mean, Raman, your question, please. Yes, thank you very much. From page -- thank you for your presentation, Councillor. From page 48, you've put down the figures you gave was 2,519 from 30 sites. 600 affordable homes from projects were 2,016 units were being built. 2,766 affordable from the project were 9,629 being built. There is a total of 5,885 affordable units. Am I understanding you properly on that? And this would exceed the 4,000 target by 1,885, which is nearly 2,000. Sorry, Councillor. I'm going to take one or two questions at a time. Please, bear with me. Are you finished, Councillor? Thank you for your question. Councillor, your question, please. Thank you, Chair. So I really welcome the target of delivering 4,000 homes between 2022 and 26. So I just want to understand the simple thing that, you know, when you say delivery, what does that mean? Is property under planning stage or property under construction or property ready for human habitation? Thank you. Thank you, Councillor. Councillor Kabir, over to you and your officers. If you could be quick with your responses, we'd be grateful. Thank you. Okay. So I mean, Paul can give you the specific breakdowns that we've looked at. Ideally, we would like people living in them, but in terms of technicalities, it's when it's signed off by planning as completed. So that's the number that would be counted at the end. Sometimes properties are advertised beforehand when we see sort of within a certain timeframe, it will be handed over. So it will go into the housing options list for people to bid for them. Paul, if you want to just do a breakdown of the numbers Councillor Amin was speaking about. Thanks, Councillor. Sorry, Councillor Amin. Can I just check which page you were looking at? Page 48. So this slide gives a breakdown of the different stages where development is happening. And I guess the issue to be aware of is the level of certainty. So as Councillor Ahmed was just saying, in terms of delivery, we are currently counting those that are completed when we receive the completion certificates, which comes through the building control stage right to the end of the process. What this slide is illustrating, I suppose, is where, for example, there are sites which are currently under construction, so for example, there's 30 sites in the borough that effectively, if they all built out to the permissions that they've got, they could deliver 2,519 affordable homes. The issue will be around timing, because those will all be running at slightly different phases, and without doing a bit more detailed work, which is arguably what we would like to do as the next stage of our research, we won't be able to tell you exactly when those will come forward, but what it's showing is the potential is there within the system. So it's about, I suppose, levels of certainty. So the highest level of certainty is obviously where something has been completed, then you've got those sites under construction, which is that group, then you've got the sites where construction has started but stopped, and that's the work that we want to do about trying to unlock those. And then the next ones are the ones that don't have planning permission yet but have the potential to get planning permission, so you're right that if you add those figures up, then it probably would exceed 4,000. The issue is about the timing of those and the delivery of those, because the only ones where there's certainty are either A) the ones that are under construction and we know that they're likely to complete, or indeed the sites which are in the council's own program where we have control over that, not just as a planning authority but also as a developer, so there's obviously a greater degree of certainty over those. These are looking at everything, so whether it's the council, whether it's the private sector, whether it's registered providers. So I hope that answers our question. Yes, thank you. Councillor Kabir, your question please, thank you. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Kabir Ahmed, for the presentation. Page 51, direct delivery by the council is a very small unit, like 471. What we can do to increase the number? And secondly, is there any updates about the London Chest Hospital? Please, thank you. Thank you, Councillor, for your question. I'll take one more. Councillor Francis, your question please, thank you. Thank you. So listening to this tonight, there's been more excuses given than hopes that have been built. And when the lead member or someone else starts praying in aid of the reason for this is because of the lift off 84 years ago, I'm kind of in despair. So a harsh critic would really, really lay into this performance, and especially given that this performance is predominantly or is increasingly based upon shared ownership and intermediate rent as well. But I'm not going to do that. I don't think we should be in a business of a race for numbers, just for numbers sake. I think there's always a balance to be struck about quality as well, because we end up, history shows that we've built homes that are of poor quality in this borough in the past, and the housing associations don't manage them well, which is why we moved back towards council housing. So I can see, because I've got the figures, that the trajectory is downwards quite considerably from an average of between 800 and 1100 between 2015 and 2022. And it's downwards. And there are economic factors that underlay that. But the other factor that underlays that is that a pause was put on approving new council housing schemes. Some of them ended up going through like Caxton recently, but others are still on hold, like Gill Street, as far as I can tell. So what I wanted to know, first of all, is if you can provide us with a list of all of those schemes that were being worked up, council housing schemes that were being worked up in 2021 and early 2022, and give us a progress report on those. And also, which new schemes, council housing schemes, have been added since then, and whether there's any buybacks. If you want to put some buybacks to former council homes or something else in as well, that's fine. You know, providing it's being let as a social tenancy, not as temporary accommodation. But the other thing I wanted to ask, and it was really missing from this, is around, I guess, kind of thinking ahead. So you've made a choice that you're going to go for the joint venture. You're going to continue with this developer-led approach, which is, you know, the political choice, I understand that. But it's likely that there's going to be a different government. It's likely that that different government is to some degree more committed to new council housing than the current government. And I just wanted to know what, if anything, is being done to try to anticipate there being a new round of affordable housing grant and Tower Hamlets getting on the front foot, being able to draw some of that in. And whether you would consider dropping some of the JV stuff that you're doing, which includes private development, and switching that to bring a public subsidy in behind that, so it could be 100% affordable. Thank you, councillor. You'll respond. Thank you. So, in relation to the political, I'll respond to that, and then Rupert, maybe if you come in on some of the other areas. So, in relation to the pipeline, the council-owned pipeline, we've got a funded program and we've got an unfunded program, and I think Karen will come in on a bit as well. So, there is already an extensive unfunded list, and we're looking to grow even more. So, if there is a new government, or whoever the government is after the 4th of July gives us the opportunity to develop out more, then there is an extensive list already in place that we can move directly towards. Because the only thing that's holding us back is the level of money that we can put in. The formulas in order to use and how much money you use, if that was sort of deregulated a little bit more, would also be helpful as well, because the funding streams are quite technical and quite restrictive. So, for us to use our own right to buy money, that can only account for, now they've pushed it up to 40%, but that's our own money. It can't account for 100%, so then we have to match fund that from another source of funds, another 60%. It used to be 30%. So, you know, if those rules could be loosened a little bit more, that would give us greater opportunity. But definitely, we want to build as many properties. Quality is at the heart of it, and that is one of the scoring mechanisms that both our planners will be looking at, and our housing delivery and capital delivery team are looking at. Rupa and Karen, if you want to respectively come in, in relation to the other areas that's been raised. Karen, if you want to go first? Yeah, thank you. Thank you, Councillor Francis. I mean, I guess part of being here in Manchester in the housing conference is to hear what might be coming our way. I mean, we've obviously been scanning all of the manifestos as they've been coming out, and I think, you know, if there is a change of government and we've got a mayor in London as well, I would be expecting that the mayor in London with a change of government would be banging on his door. You know, trying to make the case for London in terms of accommodation. But what I wanted to say was that Councillor Ahmed has picked up on a very relevant point, which is the unfunded list that we have. So there is an unfunded list of schemes that as soon as funding comes available, because we do get WIN 4106s and we do get Right to Buys, and there are grant funding opportunities from the government, that when we have those, the unfunded list is there that we can tap into and bring schemes forward. Councillor Ahmed also made the point about rules, and that's something, again, that is a really strong lobbying point. It always has been a strong lobbying point made by London Council's housing directors repeatedly, but a change of government would provide another opportunity to make that lobbying point again around how we can't use government grant alongside Right to Buy receipts or alongside 106. So if there was some flexibility around the funding, then we might be able to get schemes off the ground using a mixture of funding going into one particular site. Just on the DA sites, I mean, we talked about the unfunded sites, I think it's fair to say, Rupert, that those are probably quite moderate sites that wouldn't be too difficult to actually build out if there was funding available. But the DA sites, the development agreement sites that we asked the market to respond to in tranches of three parcels, were because they're very complicated sites and require, you know, a lot of, a lot of preparatory work. And they're complicated for heritage reasons, or they're complicated maybe for contamination reasons. So those sites would require a big capital resource. So by going out to the market to test what would the market do with those, when we get the intelligence of what the market would do with those, we set out what our minimum requirements are. And we look, we get back what the market would actually be able to produce on those meeting our minimum requirements. But we don't have to do anything with that. We're just getting intelligence, we're testing the market rather than just sitting there and thinking that maybe they're too difficult to build out. What we're doing is we're trying to test, well, you know, how could we build them out with some of our sort of, you know, red lines around them. So as Rupert said, those responses have come back and we're testing those to see whether any of those we would want to move forward with, or whether some sites that developers were more interested in than others, were the bundles in the right categories that we have the tranches right. So all of that is being looked at, and any decision to move forward with those would require a cabinet decision. So all we're doing at the moment with the DA expressions of interest is just really just trying to see whether there's, it's an enabling exercise to see whether those any of those sites could actually be enabled and brought forward because they are quite complicated. Thank you. Yes, Rupert, thank you. Thank you, Chair. Just to come in on Councillor Francis' point, you're asking about particular elements of the programme. I can't give you the answer now because obviously there's a lot of schemes, so I don't know if there's a way that can be captured as a follow-up question and we can respond accordingly for that. The second point I wanted to make was you're talking about the numbers of units that are going to be completed. We should stress, of course, that that doesn't capture ones that are currently going through the planning process or in design. So there are units quite considerable numbers beyond the ones that you see here when they fall in terms of their completion date has not been profiled. Thank you. We'll take two more questions. Councillor Anner, do you have a question? You have a question, please. Thank you. Thank you, Councillor. Yeah, sorry. On page number 36, the report said that the date does not include student recommendation. What their number of complete housing if including student recommendation. Thank you. Thank you, Councillor. I'll take one more question. Before that, I think Councillor Camus asked a question about the Chest Hospital. Was that answered? I'm not sure. Councillor Camus, if you could, please. So that's a live application, so I'm not going to comment on that. I'll let Paul come in because I don't know what's the restricted and what's sensitive. Do you want to come in on that one, Paul, just briefly? Yes, I'm happy to come and thank you, Chair. Yeah, so London Chest Hospital, it's a live planning application. It is actually scheduled to come to the Strategic Development Committee for their next meeting on 16th of July. And if members sort of wanted a bit more detail, then the application proposes 276 homes altogether under the applicant's proposals. 121 of those would be affordable, but that is split between rented and intermediate products. Thank you. Councillor, are you happy with that? Thank you. Councillor, is there another question? Mabu, you have a question? If you could be brief, thank you. Sorry. Yeah, I'm just coming back on some of these points. I think it's good we've got a region part of it today at the committee because I've been in the committee for two years and previously it's mainly been housing management. Of course it's important, but I think the reason why a lot of the members have a lot of questions is because the first time we've had region or housing delivery in particular being presented. So I think probably a few things. Page 51, third bullet point, I think it talks about an acquisition programme of 600 new council homes. And I guess the question is, is that purchasing new build, is it through JV? So that's page 51. And I think, and so some of the questions might be required to come back at the next committee meeting, but I think also would be useful to look at some of the models of delivery and optioneering. Again, we talked about JV, we talked about doing DAs and also council self-bid and I think probably some of the optioneering and what's actually being delivered and what's being taken forward I think would be useful to come back to one of the future committees. I think also around the challenges and viability, I think that probably we need something a bit more around that. And also around grants, I think again you mentioned about potential, Councillor Mark Francis mentioned about a new potential government and I think also a paper or presentation around kind of potential grant funding to help meet the viability deficit. Whether it's grants through GLA or Homes England or DLARC and also some of those challenges around second staircasing and kind of 18 metres and sometimes it might be viable to do stories in less than 18 metres just to make it viable. So I think some of those presentations and papers and data we probably would need to revisit a future committee with a bit more information and data as to how it's being tackled. Thank you Mahboob. Over to you Councillor, thank you. Mahboob's wealth of experience within the housing industry comes out. It is a very wide ranging area of the types of joint ventures and direct delivery and mechanisms that are in place in order to deliver housing and not only for us as a council but for RSLs as well as the 106 of private developers from build to rent to a whole range of other areas. It's great you've identified those issues but as to how we can bring all of that to this forum and cover each of these unique, you can spend two hours, three hours on each product item arguing its case, the pros and cons. In relation to the 600, so the council has committed through the MTFS to purchase up to 600 new homes via the GLA's match funding scheme. So we've already negotiated I think 200 and hopefully in the years to come we will try to advocate for more to come but we've already put money aside in order to sort of purchase up to 600 in relation to that. In terms of direct delivery, that's always our main focus in order to get direct delivery but again the challenges around how that funding is constructed. We have a very robust 151 officer as well as a finance team and until that money has come into the council they will not allow any sort of program to be semi-funded. So it has to be fully funded. That's the operating model. Myself as a politician would like to see every single program funded but however there is a pipeline of money through 106 that's due to come into the council. Some specifically directed towards house building itself. That's just the way that our planners have negotiated contracts with the developers. So as and when amounts of money come in we can pull programs from unfunded into funded programs. That's the direct delivery. In relation to the private developers we work very actively in trying to negotiate with them. I would like to also point out our viability team that's won national awards and was also shortlisted as the LGC finalists last week I was at the awards with them and it's a service that other councils now want to buy into because they provide an amazing service in challenging developers particularly when they claim poverty. And testing their viability in order to squeeze more out for ourselves. So they are pretty much the two main vehicles and of course Andrea is here our RSL providers also contribute a huge amount towards social housing and the vehicles they use. Do you want to answer Councillor Anner's question? We've given a breakdown of various different methods. One is the way GLA count things. There are various different methods of counting so we're just trying to be open and transparent in how different arenas count different things. So that's why that's in there. If you could just be brief. Thank you. The reason why I mentioned some of those things. I work for another Islamic authority on housing delivery. The reason why I was talking about viability and securing grant is if you want to increase the number of council delivery and increase the number of social units, funding some of that deficit through securing grant would help with this pipeline for us. And again some of the schemes that I'm currently working on, I can't say publicly but we're about to secure hundreds of millions of pounds through the GLA and I can't say anything because until the GLA confirm it. So I think that's what by securing those kind of funding it allows to meet the viability deficit and then increase the number of social units in terms of delivery and also overcome some of the stored schemes that we have. Just to also confirm we're working on a multiple of programmes like that and I can't individually go through every single one of them but there is a number of programmes but maybe if you have specific advice you can contact Rupert and forward that through and we'll be happy to listen. Anything to generate more opportunities to build social housing. We're happy to embrace that. Thank you councillor. Councillor Asma your follow up. If you could be brief please thank you, we've been waiting a long time. Thank you. If you can try and remember what my questions were at the beginning. So I talked about data and setting the scene properly. This is like Mahbub said that this is the first time in this committee you've come, it's not your fault but we've had the time to discuss this after two years. So we really like I just think the report could have been a bit more comprehensive and a lot more information to help us set the scene going forward. So for instance when I talked about data and you kind of push back a little bit is one of on page six, we've got homes built in total since 2016 to 2023, and then we're asked to look for a narrower time. It's just that, it's just been able to give us a wide range, you know later on when you come back again, then we start looking at specific dates and more towards the years that we just passed. So that's just my feedback for the future when you do come back and I will be emailing you regarding some more information that I require from this report so that's the first thing. Second thing is on page 10, you know we talked about the KPI, we've not met the KPI in the last two years. Firstly I have a question, it says 689 output for 2020 to 2023 but then it says 585 reported at quarter four. Can you just explain that because quarter four is the last one so why is there a difference? And because two years in a row we haven't been meeting the KPI, what does that mean? Are you changing the KPI? Are you expecting it to start, for us to start meeting that target in the year coming and then the fourth year? It will be really good to be really clear about that and lastly if I may say like the conversations about change of government or change of legislations, deregulation, whatever it might be, it's really important to have this data one. Secondly, actually we're able to tally off what you're saying to us here alongside those changes so we can actually say do you know what, we can prove that yes, when we've had more funding, when we've had legislation change, when we've had government change that actually this is how we've increased affordable homes, this is how we've increased social homes, our own direct delivery, whatever it is, we should be able to pinpoint and I feel like we're not digging deep enough into the evidence and the data that we need. In order to go forward and I want to be able to say like this council is really ambitious because if you look at two years ago, I'm sorry, in the bigger, wider ONS committee when you came and the team came, you guys came in with a really ambitious political, we're going to achieve this kind of attitude and I'm sorry to say today and like you seem a bit more realistic that those targets were a little bit out there and they weren't achievable. We didn't think they were achievable and transparent enough at the beginning, you push back against them, we're here and exactly what we said is going to happen has happened but so let's be realistic but there is a way to be realistic and be ambitious and we are here to push you guys to make sure that you're hitting those targets and being a bit more ambitious. Right now I just feel like I have not given enough to be able to scrutinise into that. So, chair, I'm not sure what the question was but nonetheless I'll attempt to answer what I thought the question was. So the first thing is in terms of delivery we still have that same drive, that same ambition, we have a number of programmes in chain and as I explained in the opening statement, these are delivered in tranches. So as sites are completed they drop large amounts of properties. The bigger the site, the bigger the strategic site it is, the bigger the amount it will land. So one site in particular, say the HAP programme, will deliver I think around 400 social housing units on its own. So when that completes that will land 400 social units. I've also explained challenges in terms of legislation. Now we can't get over legislation. So programmes that were programmed in within 30 metres that should have been delivered now had to go back and be redesigned to put in a second staircase. And this hasn't only affected the council's direct delivery programme, this has affected other social housing providers, joint ventures with private developers. So if I give an example of the Bing and Bellamy site, that's had to go to planning three times because of the changes in legislation as they've moved from one phase to another and that's created a two year delay in that site, the spades going in. Fortunately what I can say is the spades have gone in and they've started work. So initially the GLA set a benchmark of 30 metres and that wasn't in line with government legislation. That was their own stage two protocol that they set up that anything above 30 metres they would want to see a second staircase or else it's not going to pass their stage two approval process. So lots of developers then had to work towards that. There afterwards, quite recently, and that was a shock to the whole industry, Michael Goves announced that anything above 18 metres would need a second staircase. So as you can imagine, certain developers have had to come to us three times over in order to get that first planning permission that they would have got years ago. There's also programmes that have run into financial difficulty but there's other programmes where financially they're viable but they can't find a social housing partner because the social housing providers are putting their resources towards repairs, maintenance and regulatory compliance with the housing regulators. So it's not just unique to us, they are challenges and if we want an honest discussion and Scrutiny want an honest discussion from us, we will provide you with honest discussion and presentations which are up to date and in line with today's challenges. And once again we're happy to do that. Did you want to come in on anything else before I finish off? I just wanted to come into the question about what would be the acquisition. So the Councillor asked, maybe it was the tenant rep, I couldn't see, what would be the acquisitions programme and would it be buybacks or new build? It'll be a mixture of both and we have done a soft launch for expressions of interest around buybacks and we'll do something a bit more public soon and we've got some small schemes similar to what Councillor Ahmed was saying where registered providers may not be able to build them out. We're looking at those to see whether they could be acquired for council homes, so it will be a mixture. Thank you, Karen. Thank you, Councillor. Thank you once again for the presentation and this is a significant priority for this administration and the councils. We are grateful for the update on this. Thank you very much. We will move on to our next item. Our next item on the agenda is the review of the progress of the major works programme. I'd like to once again ask Councillor Kabir Ahmed, cabinet member for regeneration inclusive development and house building and Michael Kelly, director for asset management to present this item. Councillor Ahmed, can you introduce the item and Michael, if you wish to come in on that, you could also join in. You have five minutes to provide us with an overview of this item. Please consider the slide as taken as read by the subcommittee, so highlight any key areas that the subcommittee needs to be aware of and then we will move on to the members' questions. Thank you. Thank you, chair. The presentation provides an update on the housing capital programme, also known as the better neighbourhoods investment programme, formerly known as THH housing capital programme. It summarises expenditure and outrun of 2023 to 2024 housing capital programme, highlights that works were delivered during that period, challenges faced during 2023/24. It then explores how 2024/25 programme has been developed and outlines the work streams and anticipated spend for 2024/25. Slide two, summary of the year 23/24 programme. The housing capital programme for 23/24 originally began the year with a budget of 26.368 million, however this was subsequently revised mid-year through the financial year to 20 million and 73 thousand. Owing to the lower volume of works that was projected to be carried out. The out turned position for 23/24 was 21.097 million. The slippage of 4 million was carried forward to 24/25. Slide three, expenditure summary 23/24. This table shows the area that saw the greatest improved out term against the revised budget, that is the housing repair service budget line and mechanical and electrical works. Any slippage should be considered in light of the budget being revised in September 23 as well as the reduction in professional fees due to the lower volume of projects starting during the year. Slide four, what works were delivered 23/24. I'm just going to do an overview rather than going into the details if that's alright. And then slide five focuses on works were delivered in 23/24. Essentially we also within this area face a number of challenges, external markets, so market conditions have led to contractors claiming that they can't deliver some works in line with the published work frame rates. And it's understood that the following has contributed to increased costs, inflation impact, prelims/labor costs, plant fuel costs, we know that's increased exponentially. Now hopefully it's going down slightly, the cost of materials, subcontractors, as well as insurance costs have gone up as well. Lastly, in terms of what we want to go forward with is the improvements and the management of the capital programme. The council has invested in the creation of a housing risk team which is gathering data information to inform future programmes. Risk team will use data and information gathered to improve the understanding of housing stock and the work that is needed. In 24/25 we're planning to undertake 2,500 internal flat surveys and also window only surveys to 200 blocks. All information gathered will be used to ensure the right investment decisions are made. Work is also underway to improve the way we track capital programme. We are working on having better visibility of the programme which will provide an early warning system to help prevent future delays with the projects. Michael, would you like to add anything else? Thank you chair, evening everybody. I set out the presentation really just to provide everyone with a sense of the challenges we've experienced over the last two years. We've referenced the last year and the progress, but there's been some really intense challenges in the market. Examples were decent homeless programmes for kitchens and street properties, huge increases fed back by the contractors, no interest on certain tenders unless they were subject to 40% increases on rates and run rates within contracts on programmes being subject to about 25% increases on materials and labour costs. So our contract framework was set up and wasn't flexible enough to tender those out with anything above the agreed framework rates. So looking forward we've done some parallel work to see what those contracts look like in the future. The actual programme delivery, there was a high volume of blocks listed and presented, I think it was 2018 and that programme has commenced, but the completion on that programme wasn't as anticipated over that four year period. And that goes back as well to a period of COVID pandemic and the new approach. So our provisional sums on scoping exercises from previous years led to high variation costs. So some of those learnings we've introduced going forward in the programme. But to summarise, there's been some key complex projects that have been deferred as Councillor Ahmed said regarding new processes, new regulations and new expectations and they will be quite complex to deliver. The underspend of £4 million will be carried over and that will be summarised in the end of the financial out-term for last year, that will be June/July. So we're still on track to deliver them projects. I've put a profile budget in which has been approved and that's supported by £10 million. It's a funding that runs over the three year projection to allow us to bring complex projects over the line. Hopefully I've covered some of the risks around the capital programme, but welcome any questions. And chair, just to also note that Tracy Grace joined us online. She's the interim director of housing management. Okay, thank you Councillor for that. Thank you both for the overview on this. I think it's very useful to get a sense of our position in this. Before I move on to take questions from the members, I'd like to remind you all again to keep your questions as brief as possible and I've obviously said the same to the cabinet member and the officers to do the same. If I feel it's getting too long into the questions, I will come in and stop you. Do members have any questions? I've got on my list. Councillor Kavir, your question please. You did put your hand up? Later maybe. Okay, Councillor Amin, your question please. Thank you. Thank you for your presentation again guys. Your report suggests that contractors complain that the amount we are paying does not cover the cost. What are we doing to address the complaint? So much needed repairs can we deliver for the residents? Thank you Councillor for your question. Councillor Choudry. Mohammed Choudry, your question please. Thank you. In my ward there is a serious problem with damp and mould. It's better now because it's summer so there's not many complaints but throughout the winter there's so many complaints and also government's introduction of Awab's law, I think we have more responsibility as a social landlord. So when I look at the figures, the money spent, I didn't see anything specific. I just wanted to know do you have any data how much money has been spent to prevent or if there's any damp and mould issues within the stock we provide to the residents? Thank you Councillor and Michael your response please, thank you. So Councillor if you, I mean we'll give you a general overview but if you give us specific council owned estates in your ward we can give you that specific breakdown in relation to works that have been taking place and reports around damp and mould. Michael if you can give us a generalised breakdown around damp and mould. Okay, what we're looking for is fabric first approach. It's part of the programme for future years but part of the data we're forming is doing surveys, specialised surveys on buildings and that will give us a lot of information on the fabric of our buildings. Historical repairs, buildings subject to high levels of damp or mould or where we see trends within blocks of certain architects and designs so we're going to use that information to determine decisions, make the right decisions in fabric first approach going forward with our blocks and then introduce that into the programme. We still have some areas of work being done for the fabric of buildings and that includes elements such as roofs, windows, insulation but specifically some of the designs and architects within our stock are predominantly 1960s concrete buildings which need a specialised approach to see how we approach them for fabric first. And that's sometimes tackling the root cause of damp and mould alongside preventative responsive measures. In relation to your question about contractors costs going up, unfortunately that is the financial climate we're in. Sometimes it's cheaper to provide that top up than go through a whole tendering process and the bidding process that will happen which will actually if you put inflation on top of it will cost you more for the new tenders that are going out. So it is something that our finance team are robustly scrutinising as well as our directors here and we go through that on a regular basis scrutinising these contracts and looking at how we can challenge these contractors in relation to their performance. And again it is an area that we are very proactively working on and I mean if there are specific areas again you want identified if you give us a more detailed question then we will respond to you on an individual level in relation to that. Thank you for your response. Your mic please. Next, Councillor Kirby and I will come to you after. Your question please. Thank you chair. On page 66 the report stated that 77 buildings meet the criteria for great way assistance. How many buildings don't meet the criteria? Can you just explain please? Thank you Councillor for your question. I will take one more question and we will get the response from the Councillor and the officer. Mark Francis your question please. Thank you. Thank you. So I have in my head a figure of 90 million pounds that was allocated for major works in the capital investment programme for council housing stock and that was in 1998 and with like 25 years later we are trying to do or admittedly with probably only around half the stock like a lot too much work with too little money. And I think that is one of the challenges that you have described about the rates in the contract and about the slippage in the programme is it seems to me to be partly that we have squeezed as an authority, tried to squeeze too much out of too little money and I think one of the things that this committee I hope will look at is whether we ought to be making a recommendation that the council should push more, should put more into capital. For our own housing stock and one of the reasons why I said that if this was just about you know this is just ongoing work then so be it but for years now I have got constituents who have been told you know your thing isn't going to come this year but it is in the programme and you know just wait a couple of years and you know your day will come. And so far very few of those residents or tenants are seeing their day come. To be fair to the team they did manage to do some street properties in my ward in Hewison Street and that was really good high quality work and that is great. New windows, new patio doors, new front doors all of that which helps with energy efficiency but it is too little and in the meantime a lot of vulnerable tenants are really suffering. So one of the things that I would like us to think about and maybe discuss not today but for you all to discuss is should we be making a recommendation about there needs to be more going into this. You know like what we see here in this is the top lines you know this isn't everything that needs to happen this is just a small snapshot of what will happen or might happen and we need to get under the skin of that. The final thing I wanted to say very specifically though is around street properties so we are kind of inching around the borough doing up street properties some of which are old Victorian buildings and will cost a lot of money and there is a judgement to be made about those. But some of them are not and they really really it's long overdue that those properties got a double glazing at least and a new front door so I wondered if we could get an update on the street property programme which I was told would go to contract in by Easter. Thank you councillors for your question. Councillor your response please and the officer. Can I answer Councillor Kabir's question first. It's 77 buildings you know that we've identified but the list is as inspections come through the list may grow further so how many we can't tell you at the moment. We've got 928 blocks in total but the gateway process consists on the high rise which is 77 blocks but across those 18 metres and anything over 7 floors or 7 storeys plus low rise blocks which are 2 to 3 storeys we're anticipating more regulations more expectations so we're trying to plan ahead because there's going to be activity in the housing sector again. Again up in that game across different blocks and levels and heights they're already introducing new regulations for blocks over 18 metres so we're planning ahead for that for fire safety work specifically for the gateway process. In relation to Mark's question I can give you a comprehensive update on the street property programme but we'd like to feed back if it's ok because we have expanded our single elemental streams and we're now procurement for not only for fire safety systems on it. What we call elemental streams so direct contracts with contractors to go and do a programme a transit programme with windows, doors, individual boilers alongside fire safety systems so I think the street properties and you are right Mark there are terraced ones that are Victorian but I think in total we've got about 458 street properties and they will be subject to some improvements so that is planned and I can come back and give an individual update on that if it's ok. Thank you for your responses. Councillor Asma your question please. Yeah so I know this is like a really challenging area and it's not one like compared to what needs to happen like we just don't have the money unless we go through another phase of real government investment like the last decent home programme. But at the same time I think I want to touch on Mark's point about how we like it would have been good if we could have had a list of what the major work programme does look for us so I know we've got some examples we've got two actually on page 11. But as a whole of where like the table of when the time is I know there's been some pushback on some of the dates. They've started later and some are planned to start even later than what residents are expecting. And I know there are some estates that actually they've been delayed so many times that is 6, 8, 10, 12 years. It's just I think it's worth having a conversation here about which ones I know the delays are because of finances and I know I understand some of the new legislations around fire safety and damper mould has really taken a big hit on this programme but it would be really worth us looking at it and saying well are we like by delaying are we creating another set of problems that eventually end up costing us more than delaying so it's just worth having a look at that and balancing that so could you give me a little bit of an idea of if that information can be available for us as what the entire major programme looks like. Dates and stuff and yeah the rest were comments so I don't know if that's helpful. We are due to enter our revised two year programme on the 31st of July so it will be available on our website for residents and update on the capital programme. And I mentioned earlier there was a large volume of projects that have been deferred for different reasons and some of them aren't due to finances they're due to complexities around building control and new regulations and there are examples where we've got complex projects that they started off with a lot lesser value and now they've increased that value because of complex works and fire safety and building safety works so that update will be on the 31st of July. And we could support that potentially by listing some highlights and risks within some of the complex projects. That answers your question. Thank you Michael. Mahboob, your question please. Sorry, did you want to come in? No, fine. Mahboob, your question please. If you could be to the point. Thank you, I'd be grateful. Thank you. Hi Michael. Page 68, just to add on to what Councillor Asma Islam said around kind of the capital programme going forward, page 60 I think you mentioned two things, fire safety and decent homes. I think it would be useful to have data around both of those elements in the capital programme going forward as to what's being delivered or for example maybe perhaps not meeting the decent home standards. I think that would be number one. And as you know I was previously on THH's board and yet we had Odette Duvel House in Clichy Estate which had combustible panels. I've seen the scaffoldings come down, has the work been completed and finally Maltings and Brewster structural issues, where are we with those? Thank you Mahboob. Yes, one more question. Councillor, do you have a question? No? Councillor Mohammed Choudry? Fine, over to you, thank you. So if I start with Maltings and Brewster, my personal feeling around that is I think we should have gone through a wholesale regeneration programme with that. We've gone into a very costly contractual refurbishment programme and that was before our time we came in there and you as a former member of the THH board will also be privy to some of that information. Unfortunately we are in the situation where we are. We've had meetings with some of the residents and also the contractors there as well and there is a number of technical issues that are causing delays. I'd like to disclose some of that information. I want to just give a brief summary. So Maltings and Brewster, the structural works did start January last year. We devised a programme to suit decant for residents and Angela House was nominated as a decant block. So that progresses. We're in early stages of those structural steals going in. I think we're in floor three or four so it's a systematic approach to the 22 levels of steel strengthening works. It is progressing. There were some issues early on about contracts and putting them in place and getting best value for money and that's seen an increase in contract values as well because of the delays. That was around materials, supply chain, steel being imported, lots of different constraints around the Maltings and Brewster contract. But as Councillor Kabir said I think retrospectively looking back maybe an evaluation of those blocks would have been different if we'd known what to anticipate if I'm honest. We will update Maltings and Brewster because that will need quite a big sign off and it's quite a step for us to take once we've completed that because I believe it's very complex, one of the unique projects across nationally. Decent homes. We are targeting decent homes. We've got some programmes coming up for kitchens and bathrooms and that was delayed slightly because of the cost increases. But we did work that out with contractors and we agreed rates. I think we did 53 last year, kitchens for example and that will continue this year in the programme. Fire safety. Those streams of work continue and progress. Just to put things into context, the pool of money that's available, while previously we could be flexible and push it towards decent homes and other areas, right now every social housing provider in the country is directing a sizeable amount of money towards fire safety. We've got one of the highest number of tall buildings in the country, in London definitely, which means that we've got to put a robust amount of money aside in relation to tackle some of those issues and concerns and where there are concerns we have to put things like waking watch and so on and so forth in place. And as we are going through the process of these assessments, quite recently my ward, Kasra Aslam's ward, Weavers, we had Johnson House which suddenly came across, it wasn't on the radar, but when the assessments came in there was a risk. So what we've done is we've invested as a council into a building safety team, around 2 million pounds we've put in, in order to expediate the process of identification for these. So when each of these blocks are identified, resources have to be, as a matter of priority, directed towards that. It's unfortunate, but people's lives and safety has to come first. If I can just speak back, apologies Mabu, I did lose my trail of thought there, but for the stock condition data and the report on decency, we were quite targeted around meeting decency across 14% of our stock reaching the criteria and then the new introduction of new decency measures. But we have invested in Ridge to do 100% surveys across stock, 20% each year, so all of our internal homes will have a condition survey, rather than a 20% sample as previous programme. So we're investing in that data, the information, so there will be a new outcome of when that programme is completed of decent homes target for our stock. I just want to reference that, we are investing in the information. Thank you, thank you Councillor and thank you Michael. No one else? That's it. Thank you very much to both of you for your presentation, your overview, taking the questions and the answers, we are grateful. And goodnight to you both and we'll move on to our next item. Any other business? Yes Paul, thank you. Thank you chair, I just have one thing I'd like to say, we're currently developing the work programme for scrutiny for next year. I know several members have been to meetings to have an input on that, but I just wanted to say to any member that hasn't had a chance to do that, if you do have any items that you want to make sure discussed, you can email me and I can make sure that they're taken into consideration along with everything else. Thank you Paul for that update. With no other business to discuss, I call this meeting to an end. Thank you very much to all the committee members here tonight and those who have joined us online. The next meeting will be on the 16th of September 2024. Thank you very much, goodnight.