We recognise that tenant participation means different things to different people. We will therefore ensure that we use different forms of engagement to suit as many different people as we can. We will continue to develop new options that allow tenants to become more involved in a way that suits them.
Angus-wide options
Angus Tenants’ Steering Group: this group has been established for many years. Over the years the remit of the group has evolved with the changing nature of housing. The group discusses:
- Housing strategies/policies – for example, this Tenant Participation Strategy and Common Allocation Policy.
- Service and procedures – for example, repairs, heating/kitchen/bathroom programmes.
- Rent setting and financial matters – for example, income, investment, new build projects and annual rent setting.
- Scrutiny and performance - for example, our annual Charter Return.
- National consultations – for example, the Scottish Social Housing Charter Review & Housing Beyond 2021.
We continue to engage fully with this group, which helps us come to decisions which are right for all tenants. It continually monitors and reviews our current policies and assists us to develop new strategies or policies.
The group is also involved in discussing tenant initiatives locally and nationally to encourage more engagement.
Tenant’s E-panel: we understand not everyone is keen or able to attend meetings. Therefore, we are committed to developing a way of becoming involved in shaping our services from the comfort of your own home by getting involved in our E-Panel. We are looking to get tenants signed up to be part of our panel, if you are interested, please register at tenantparticipation@angus.gov.uk.
Once we have enough participants registered we will send out information regarding new policies, procedures or consultations that we wish to discuss with them by email, or use social media as a more interactive method to get a discussion going, for example, a closed group on Facebook or other social media platforms.
Customer Satisfaction: we ask a randomly selected group of 1000 tenants a range of satisfaction questions which, as well as giving us important information about how our services are performing, also contributes to our Scottish Social Housing Charter return.
Tenant Led Scrutiny/Service Reviews: Scrutiny and service reviews involve tenants in the self- assessment of services. It was introduced to give tenants an enhanced role in the scrutiny of performance and enable them to compare their landlord’s performance against others.
In Angus, we have so far completed a valuable review into our unplanned repairs service. Our group have been able to get involved in reviewing our performance and providing us with recommendations for improvement which we are taking forward with one of the Housing Improvement Teams.
We provide training to give individuals the tools, skills, knowledge, and confidence required to carry out this type of activity, but it doesn’t have to stop there, we have opportunities for our group to develop further their own personal learning skills and in some cases, receive accreditation for their learning.
We want to involve more tenants in shaping, improving our services and our next service review, so we are developing new ways of becoming involved. If you are interested, please register at tenantparticipation@angus.gov.uk.
Local options
Tenants and Residents Groups including Registered tenant Organisations (RTOs)
The council will support tenants and residents groups. We have several across Angus, some registered and some not. If you want to find out more about any of these groups in your area, please contact tenantparticipation@angus.gov.uk.
To become a registered group, there are criteria to be met, such as being a constituted group with a defined geographical area that your group is representing. If you need more details about the criteria required and you are looking for the help and support to form an RTO please contact our communities officers at tenantparticipation@angus.gov.uk.
If a group becomes registered, it strengthens their rights to be consulted on national housing policy. There is also an entitlement to start-up grant funding and annual funding to help with the running of the group. We will carry out annual reviews to keep the register up to date. If however, you wish to set up a group or already have a group established but don’t meet the criteria of an RTO, we will still offer help and support to meet these requirements.
Regional Tenant Participation Networks
RTOs can also become members of a Regional Network. The Tayforth Regional Network is made up of RTOs from Angus, Dundee, Fife and Perth & Kinross. Being part of this larger network ensures RTOs have a voice Scotland wide, enabling them to share ideas and information with similar groups throughout Scotland.
Local Neighbourhood Walkabouts
Neighbourhood walkabouts are an opportunity for local residents, council staff and any relevant parties, including housing association staff and tenants to work together to make their neighbourhoods a better place to live.
In Angus, we have been developing these walkabouts, and we have also been taking actions forward through our charrette activities at a larger scale by locality. We will be continuing these activities at local neighbourhood level and wider locality area events across Angus.