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ALMO under threat as South West council reviews housing options
A council is considering bringing its ALMO back in-house ahead of merging with two other authorities.
Conservative-run Borough of Poole has conducted an independent review of its housing services as it mulls over whether to dissolve Poole Housing Partnership (PHP), which manages the authority’s 5,000 homes.
The council’s People Overview and Scrutiny Committee considered the review document at a meeting yesterday evening.
A petition signed by 350 Poole residents calling for the council to reject any recommendations “which could result in the closure of, or reduction in” PHP services has been submitted to the council.
The review, carried out by housing consultancy Campbell Tickell, models the implications for Poole’s housing services if the council retains its ALMO or brings the service in-house.
It concludes that retaining PHP “in its current form is not an option”, but suggests savings would be “broadly similar” regardless of whether it is dissolved.
Housing service costs could be cut by £313,000 a year if the ALMO was brought in-house, the report says, but PHP has claimed it could find annual savings of up to £500,000.
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Avril King, chair of the Tenant Involvement and Empowerment Panel at PHP, has written to the committee urging it to recommend that the ALMO is retained.
In the letter, she said: “Without knowing how the councils of Dorset will be organised, how can the Borough of Poole possibly offer a long-term vision for a landlord service? The answer is that it currently cannot.”
The authority said no decisions on the future of PHP would be made until “early in the new year”, but Inside Housing understands there is strong political support among councillors for bringing the ALMO in-house.
Poole is likely to merge with neighbouring Bournemouth Borough Council and Christchurch Borough Council in 2019 to form a new unitary authority as part of a reorganisation of Dorset’s local authorities.
Bournemouth has in-house housing services, while Christchurch transferred its stock to a housing association in the early 1990s.
PHP was awarded a 30-year agreement to manage Poole’s council housing stock as recently as April 2014.
In its response to the review, PHP’s board said the findings “make a strong case” for its retention and that housing services in the borough should be reviewed by the new unitary authority.
Karen Rampton, cabinet portfolio holder for housing and community services at Borough of Poole, said: “We would like to thank everyone who has assisted with the review process.
“The next step will be for the council to formulate its views about how to take the content of the report forward and it is hoped that we will be in a position to confirm this early in 2018.”
