Issue - meetings

To seek approval for a Tenancy Strategy and Policy 2012 – 2014.

(Report attached)

The Committee was informed that the authority was required under the Localism Act 2011 to prepare and publish a Tenancy Strategy by 15^th January 2013. It was reported that a Tenancy Policy for the Borough would follow in due course. The Strategy set out the major considerations to which registered providers of social housing within the Borough were to have regard in formulating their tenancy policies.

Members broadly welcomed the report, whilst recognising that demand for social housing in the Borough and elsewhere significantly exceeded supply. It was hoped that the introduction of non-secure tenancies might provide some scope for more efficient use of the social housing stock in Redditch. Members were keen that communities should continue to be sustainable and did not wish to see a move towards transient populations and there was an expectation that the Council’s forthcoming Policy would mitigate against this. In this regard, there was an acceptance that the model for tenure that had existed for a number of decades was changing across the country, not least because of the present financial situation.

RESOLVED that

the Tenancy Strategy, at Appendix 1 to the report, be approved.