Agenda item

The Director of Housing submits a report that provides an update on the current position of the Repairs and Maintenance Team, its performance throughout 2024-25 and projections for 2025-26; highlighting challenges and improvement actions.

The Heads of Service presented an update on the current position of the Repairs and Maintenance performance, including responsive repairs, voids, and damp and mould, the team’s performance throughout 2024-24 and projections for 2025-26. It was noted that:

·       There was new legislation around Electrical and HHSRS inspections. The team, therefore, anticipated having requests through that route.

·       One of the challenges had been around vacancies (with 32 currently, which represents 10% of the Council’s craft workforce). This impacted the team's capacity to undertake as many repairs as it would like.

·       A positive development was that outstanding repairs had gone down by 3,000 for total outstanding, and by over 1000 in the repairs that were out-of-category. Hence, the overall repair trend was on a positive trajectory.

·       The overall repair trends had been stable, which was beneficial in predicting demands. Work was still ongoing to improve the overall position of the Repairs team.

·       The four tenant satisfaction measures showed good progress in comparison to other local authorities. The transactional surveys were over 95% positive as well.

·       The team was continuing work with contractors to explore additional capacity to get through the repairs. One of the major goals of the team this year was the investment in staff and an increase in the apprenticeship programme. This is due to a significant skills gap in the craft sector, and this was a way for the Council to proactively address this.

·       The team was working hard to achieve its projections and targets for the year.

·       On voids, it was noted that;

o   The previous reports had highlighted some improvements. Part of this improvement was the merger of the damp and mould teams within the voids team. The impact on voids had been relatively minimal, while there had been incredibly positive improvements with damp and mould.

o   It was expected that there would be a slight increase in the voids outstanding although still very low numbers, as the teams got involved in supporting voids and damp and mould works, but these projections were based on a stable resource position.

·       On Damp and mould, it was noted that:

o   Awareness had heightened on damp and mould, particularly since the unfortunate passing of Awaab Ishak.

o   The Council promptly responded to remedial works, and the Service had been focused on reducing outstanding works to meet the requirements of phase 1 of Awaab’s law, which would become effective from October 2025.

o   There were currently no out-of-category inspections outstanding, and there has been a significant improvement in the outstanding remedials, which at the time of the report sat at 689 outstanding, and 546 out of category.

o   47% of all live remedials outstanding had been visited, in addition to initial inspections to survey for materials, undertake damp and mould cleaning or commence remedial repairs.

o   The projection was to clear all out-of-category remedials by December 2025, based on the assumption that resource were stable, contractors would continue to meet expectations, and the team would be able to gain access to properties.

o   The number of reports was likely to continue to grow now that we were approaching the colder months.

o   Damp and mould were linked to multiple projects because of their multifaceted nature and requiring different actions. Where vulnerabilities were identified, multi-agency meetings were held with technical services and the repairs team to brainstorm the best outcome. There was also a partnership with social work and health professionals to ensure relevant information was obtained in making informed decisions.

o   One of the challenges the team continued to face was in respect to job cancellations, however, there has been an improvement in the last six months.

o   Some of the changes that would be introduced by Awaab’s law from 27October 2025 was around timelines for investigation and the steps that must be taken by the Council as a social landlord in relation to damp and mould (detailed in the report). Further extensions would be introduced by Awaab’s law in 2026 and 2027.

In response to comments and questions, the following was noted;

·       In reference to complaints around hot water, particularly in the shower, and heating, it was explained that showers were normally set to a regulated temperature to prevent scalding. Delays to radiators may impact areas served by district heating due to their special design. Members were encouraged to report any individual cases.

·       Tenants could opt out of Light House by discussing it with the relevant housing officer.

·       Performance was measured through KPIs shared in the senior management meeting. The team also periodically attended members' briefings and Executive meetings to provide updates, as well as brought reports to the Housing Scrutiny Commission.

·       There had been improvements with satisfaction levels; however, the team wanted to increase the types of transactional surveys and response rates so that the service could have a live dialogue of feedback from customers, feed that into the dashboard, and extract quantitative information; as a future way to shape service. Additionally, there were plans to liaise more with the tenant scrutiny panel to get feedback.

·       The team was aware of the demand coming in and was building the repairs team to meet these demands through the apprenticeship programme, building its contractor base etc.

·       Regarding what could be done to reduce the tide of tenant cancellations, the plan was to reverse engineer the process and work backwards to better understand the tenants’ needs and requirements,  utilising information from the different types of surveys and feedback. This would also involve adopting effective and suitable communication techniques.

·       Tenants were normally informed at the beginning of tenancies about the potential need for contractor access for repairs. One of the reasons for cancellations was due to the chaotic lifestyle of some tenants with complex needs, which subsequently impacted their ability to maintain appointments. The council supported such cases through the STAR service. The Council also had an access procedure that could be invoked where a tenant continually refused access.

AGREED:

1)    That the report be noted.

2)      That comments made by members of this commission to be taken into account.

3)    The Council’s approach to implementing Awaab’s Law to be added to thework programme.