Agenda item

To receive and discuss the quarter 4 Performance Dashboard information for the Homes Policy Development Group area.  

The Group were presented with, and NOTED, two slides * showing performance information in the Mid Devon Housing area both under the Housing Revenue Account (HRA) and the general Fund (GF).

The dashboards aimed to give an ‘at a glance’ understanding of how services were performing in terms of performance measures, finance and risk. Any measures that were also part of the Corporate Plan were listed in yellow text.

The indicators were presented with current performance, the annual target and a RAG (red/amber/green) rating to indicate whether or not the Council was on track to meet its target. Overall performance was presented in a pie chart which combined the RAG ratings for both the performance and the finance measures.

General Fund

·         The Outturn relating to the General Fund was showing an under spend due to the late Homelessness Prevention Grant of £241k being received in 2024/25. Without that the service had slightly overspent, hence Red RAG status.

Housing Revenue Account (HRA)

·         MDH Delivery of new Social Housing - Red  and New net-zero properties (also at Red) -  There had been delays to live projects, as well as difficulties awarding contracts for some projects which had contributed to this. The data only included homes when they were available for occupancy.  As such there should be a significant rise at the start of this new financial year as more homes became available for occupation, such as at St George's Court.

·         Market delivery of new affordable homes Year To Date (YTD) was showing as Red. This was an annual performance indicator and detailed the gross number of affordable housing units built or created across the district. This represented the overall housing market's creation of affordable homes. The target would be revised alongside the new Local Plan.

·         Complaints responded to within Complaints Handling Code timescales was Amber. There was 100% compliance in Q4, Q3, and Q2. The only underperformance was back in Quarter 1, when 3 complaints were not responded to within the code timescales.

·         HRA – Outturn was showing as Red. This was for a number of reasons including the Post Hill development; costs of viability studies for developments which had not proceeded; and the costs of converting St. George's court into accessible housing.

·         HRA – Tenant Income (Outturn) - This related to the reduction in rent in 2024/25 following the correction of the rent formula.

·         HRA – Capital Outturn was showing as Amber. Spend was relatively close to the budget being within 5%. There were some projects under and over spending. The over spends generally related to Right-to-buy buybacks.

·         HRA – Capital Slippage % of development projects (current) was showing as Amber. 10 out of 42 projects had slipped – again relatively good and quite common for capital projects. This was offset to a degree with 5 projects accelerated from future years.

Discussion took place regarding:

·         Delivery of Social Housing – was this total or YTD? Could figures not reflect if they were year totals or work in progress? It was explained that the figure showing was the outturn figure for last year. It would be misleading to include properties that were acquired or developed but not yet available for letting, when these were fully online the numbers would be included. This was not a linear issue but would be shown in stages.

·         Complaint Response Time target 100% - was that reasonable? It was explained that this was a mandatory code from the Housing Ombudsman and had been in place for the last three years for Housing. That Housing therefore had had time to embed procedures to deal with this and therefore aiming for the 100% target was achievable.

·         MDH specific tenant engagement events (YTD) was shown as 206 with a target of 100. It was confirmed this was a typo and would be corrected, however the outturn was still above target.

·         Two year’s worth of data under the new Tenant Satisfaction Measures would be needed before a target could be set in relation to ‘MDH Antisocial behaviour cases relative to the size of the landlord’.

·         ASB reports were dealt with on a case by case basis. The Council had an ASB policy and toolkit to assist in tackling this issue. It could be time consuming and challenging with many factors to take into account.

·         It was confirmed again that eviction was the very last resort with all other avenues having been explored.

·         Reference to indices of multiple deprivation could be helpful in analysing and assessing ASB cases but this was a complex area.

·         The Ombudsman would always look at the Council’s policies in relation to complaints issues or ASB to check that the Council had done what it said it would do in the policy.

·         It was confirmed it was not unusual for capital projects to slip.

Note: * Slides previously circulated.