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Large association breaches Home Standard over missing safety data in 2,000 blocks
A large housing association with homes across the South of England breached the Home Standard for failing to have clear records of whether a fire risk assessment (FRA) was required in the communal areas of 2,000 of its blocks.
In a judgement published today, the Regulator of Social Housing (RSH) found that Sovereign Housing Association, which owns and manages 60,000 homes, failed to meet statutory health and safety requirements in relation to communal fire, electrical and asbestos safety on hundreds of its blocks.
The finding follows a self-referral by Sovereign after it identified some potentially incomplete data about the number of communal areas it was responsible for.
The RSH found that the social landlord did not have a clear record of whether it had inspected electrical installations in 2,000 of its blocks.
It also emerged that several hundred communal areas had never had an asbestos survey and that a similar amount had surveys but had not been included in the reinspection programme.
The judgement said: “For these reasons, the regulator has concluded that Sovereign has breached the Home Standard, and that, as a consequence, there was the potential for serious detriment to tenants.”
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Sovereign has begun an “intensive programme of data validation” to resolve the issues, along with a recovery programme prioritised by risk.
A separate investigation into the root cause of the problems is also under way.
Mark Washer, chief executive of Sovereign, said that customers’ safety “is our number-one priority”.
“As soon as we uncovered the fact that historic data on communal areas was incomplete, we set in train three major recovery programmes.
“We have been working round the clock to establish both whether our blocks have a communal area that should be subject to checks, and if so whether those checks are up-to-date.
“We have invested over £1.5m in these programmes, and I am pleased that we have acted to put this right so quickly.
“We have completed the overwhelming bulk of inspections, and we will have finished the remaining inspections by the end of February,” he said.
He added that it is “completely unacceptable” that Sovereign’s data and processes meant it did not have a clear picture of whether blocks “have communal areas and if so if they need safety checks”.
Mr Washer said: “I recognise that managing data in a large and complex organisation like Sovereign, with over 60,000 homes, and which has been the product of successive mergers, presents challenges.
“However, there is no excuse [for] failing to keep accurate records of a building’s safety.
“The measures we are putting in place as part of our building safety and compliance framework must ensure that this can never happen again.”
The regulator also published an interim regulatory judgement for Aster Group following a merger, which found that it is meeting both governance and viability requirements.
Aster officially merged with London-based older people’s housing specialist Central & Cecil this month, bringing together a combined total of 34,500 homes.
The RSH also published strapline regulatory judgements confirming the existing grades for Hyde (G1 for governance and V2 for financial viability), ForHousing (G2/V1) and Settle (G1/V1).
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