Agenda item

The committee discussed issues on the Brandon Estate, the session had been requested by ward councillors in view of their concerns about some aspects of the council’s response to 3 murders on the estate.

The committee heard from ward councillors, tenants and residents association (T&RA) chairs, cabinet member Councillor Evelyn Akoto and senior council officers. The particular areas of concern were the delay in decision making around installing CCTV cameras, slowness of progress in establishing a young people’s hub at the Jack Hobbs Club, the nature of the council’s engagement with residents, heating outages and the system of compensation for outages.

The Brandon Estate TRA raised queries on:

·  New Homes on Brandon Estate, which sites, dates, when 2020-2025 who are they for, council tenants on waiting list, social housing market rents.

·  Hidden homes, report on the walkabout done December 2019, done on the Brandon Estate Services Charges for Major works for Phase 2 and 3.

·  Confirmation of works, when will leaseholders be served Section 20 notices, costs.

·  Services Charges for the year, why was there an increase, no explanation?

RESOLVED:

1.  That a core group of councillors, officers and residents meets regularly to review progress against the issues.  This group should undertake a holistic review to ensure that all the strands of work in hand meet residents’ needs.  The group should work transparently by publishing  documents such as action plans with RAG rating and minutes of its meetings. 

2.  That a clear timetable is set out and delivered  for full access to the Jack Hobbs Club by April 2020

3.  That the housing scrutiny commission’s review of district heating networks should include Brandon as one of its case studies.  This should include the question of how compensation for heating outages is paid – i.e. whether it can be credited to bank accounts instead of rent/service charge accounts. 

4.  That an investigation be undertaken into the amount of time it took to implement the new CCTV, and that a report arising from the investigation be provided to the Overview and Scrutiny Committee.