Obituary: Andrew Malone
Andrew Malone founded Nottingham Community Housing Association and ran it for decades. Following his death last week, Bill Randall writes about his life
In 1973, Andrew Malone, who died last week, persuaded Shelter to fund a new charity in Nottingham to house Ugandan refugees.
The funding, loaned over three years, was matched by the city council. From this modest beginning, Nottingham Community Housing Association (NCHA) was born.
While the association did not house any Ugandan refugees, it has changed the lives of many people for the better.
Fifty years on, Andrew’s legacy is an organisation with more than 10,000 homes, housing more than 20,000 people across six counties in the East Midlands.
It employs 1,200 people, has an annual turnover of £100m and works across 32 local authorities. Significantly, both chief executives who have succeeded Andrew since he retired in 2007 were recruited from NCHA’s ranks and have maintained the association’s strong community-based approach.
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Born in Luton in 1944 and raised in Cardiff, Andrew went from grammar school to Birmingham university, where he swapped law for classics and met his wife, Diana.
After university, he taught in a Birmingham primary school until 1971, when he exchanged teaching for housing and joined Shelter as a Bristol-based regional officer. Two years later came the move to Nottingham.
Innovation, partnership working and determination were the hallmarks of his work, particularly in producing supported housing schemes, among them the first women’s refuge in England outside London.
Regeneration of the Nottingham Lace Market produced the first market-rent scheme outside London and is one of many major NCHA schemes, most of it social rented housing, in towns and cities in the East Midlands.
Under his stewardship, the association completed 2,000 homes in market towns and villages, making it one of the biggest rural social housing providers in the UK. He was awarded an OBE for his work in 2005.
A member of the council of the National Federation of Housing Associations (NFHA), now the National Housing Federation (NHF), for many years, he also served as chair of its East Midlands region.
Lord Richard Best, who worked closely with him during his time as director of the NFHA, says: “Andrew had a deep commitment to social justice and genuinely community-based housing. He was one of the most engaging and inspiring people I have been honoured to call my friend for the last 50 years.”
A committed European, he leaves an international legacy. “Andrew was passionate about sharing learning and experience and believed all countries have much to learn from each other,” says David Orr, a former chief executive of the NHF.
“He was a founder of what became Housing Europe and its first UK-based president (1997-99). He was a driving force behind other European housing networks, like the Nunspeet group.”
Andrew’s bravery and doggedness were beyond question. He survived pancreatitis, bladder and prostate cancer and a series of back operations that put him in a wheelchair, without complaint.
None of this halted his regular trips from Newark to London for Ronnie Scott’s, the Royal Opera House and Lord’s, or to Cardiff for Welsh rugby internationals.
Passionate and deeply knowledgeable about opera, jazz, art, good food and literature (he had all Samuel Beckett’s books in first edition), he was a thoughtful and constant friend with a great sense of fun.
His gift of friendship brought together housing old hands from the UK and Europe for an annual Christmas lunch in London and other meetings during the year.
Andrew is survived by Diana, three daughters and five grandchildren. He will be sorely missed by a great many people, not least at the NCHA’s 50th anniversary celebrations in April.
As current chief executive Paul Moat says: “Without Andrew Malone, there would be no NCHA.”
