Our priorities
Since the previous housing strategy, homelessness and rough sleeping in Hounslow have both increased over threefold, driven by a chronic mismatch between demand and supply of housing in the borough and an acute lack of suitable, affordable accommodation to meet people’s needs. The number of households in Temporary Accommodation (TA) nearly doubled during the pandemic but has since been successfully reduced and held at the previous, pre-pandemic, level. This reduction was, in part, due to move-on of TA households into units of new-build council housing. However, the supply pipeline of new council homes will unfortunately dissipate during the early years of this strategy, as funding is exhausted. Further actions are therefore required to mitigate the risk of TA use in Hounslow radically increasing, in line with increasing homeless demand.
To address this priority, we will:
- Improve our Homeless prevention outcomes, through better outreach, more targeted advice and support for the groups that are most susceptible to homelessness, and closer partnership working to provide more wraparound support.
- Reinforce the emphasis on assisting the most vulnerable homeless households and supporting groups disproportionately affected by homelessness, making clearer the help available for those who are lower priority, by updating our Allocations Policy and housing advice to residents.
- Optimise the use of Temporary Accommodation, minimising the numbers while optimising the safety, quality and cost, by incentivising move-on for residents and strategic procurement of properties from landlords.
- Develop our pathway to help rough sleepers get and stay off the streets, addressing the root causes of homelessness including existing vulnerabilities, joblessness, lack of family support, mental health, and substance misuse needs, to help sustain them in appropriate accommodation.
The benefits for residents will be:
- Households at risk of homelessness receive assistance well in advance of any potential eviction, enabling significant numbers of cases to be resolved before the loss of accommodation becomes a significant issue.
- Residents understand their housing options and make an informed choice of whether to prioritise waiting for social housing or seeking alternative accommodation.
- Fewer households reside in Temporary Accommodation and households spend less time in TA overall, which is expensive to maintain and detrimental to families if used over the longer term.
- Greater numbers of rough sleepers are supported into longer-term, secure-tenure accommodation, reducing the number and proportion of previously known rough sleepers that return to the streets.
The plan for delivery is:
| Activity | Measure |
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Review our current Prevention offer, reflecting on specific challenges for tenants of private rented accommodation, those staying with family and friends, inter-generational households; and the Council’s overarching duties to groups such as Domestic Abuse victims, Care Leavers, Children’s Act families, immigration, asylum seeker and refugee households, and ex-offenders.
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Total number of households whose prevention duty ended with accommodation secured / Total number of households whose prevention duty ended.
Number of households receiving support during Prevention and Relief duties.
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Update our Allocations Policy and its associated Lettings Plan, reflecting on the expected waiting times, the priority weighting given to categories of need such as household income and overcrowding, the pathways for larger households, and the advice given to people who do not qualify to join the waiting list.
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Average Housing Register waiting times, broken down by category including equalities characteristics.
Average time to relet void properties. |
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Optimise the use of Temporary Accommodation, minimising numbers, maintaining standards and controlling costs while offering suitable incentives for landlords; ensuring that out of borough placements are used proportionately and sympathetically to the needs of households, mindful of their work, education and disabilities; bringing forward options for securing additional homeless hostel capacity in Hounslow.
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Total number of households in Temporary Accommodation.
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Develop a rough sleeper pathway to help people get and stay off the streets that addresses partnerships, outreach, mental health, substance misuse, provision of dedicated accommodation and support once assisted into longer-term housing.
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Combined Homelessness And Information Network (CHAIN) total rough sleeper number.
Number and proportion of rough sleepers accessing additional support. |
In October 2019, the Grenfell Inquiry published its Phase 1 recommendations on the initial cause and spread of the fire, and the management of safety in the council housing block. Its Phase 2 recommendations on the London Fire Brigade response, failings in the building safety regulations and listening to the concerns of tenants, were published in September 2024. Between these dates the Government introduced new legislation in the form of the Building Safety Act 2022, Fire Safety Regulations 2022, and the Social Housing Regulation Act 2023, all of which reiterated and stressed the importance of building and resident safety. Having regard to all of these and the Council’s own priorities, we have set out the following activities to meet our commitment to the highest standards of health and safety compliance, decency, and tenant satisfaction.
To address this priority, we will:
- Ensure the highest standards of health and safety compliance, continuing and building on our existing successes with a new, dedicated ICT system, closer cooperation between safety specialists and housing officers, and incorporating the new requirements under Awaab’s Law.
- Maintain and make good use of our council homes, formally adopting a new Council Housing Asset Management Plan and using it to review options for disused properties, alongside improved support for tenants looking to downsize or move house.
- Manage tenancies effectively, fairly and transparently, implementing new policies aligned to the Regulator of Social Housing’s Consumer Standards, evaluating their impact to ensure they are beneficial for all tenants.
- Listen and respond to our tenants’ concerns, engaging with more residents to develop, harness and learn from their feedback and complaints.
- Deliver an efficient, value for money repairs service, by optimising our commissioning arrangements and streamlining processes.
The benefits for residents will be:
- Safer Council homes that are not likely to result in injury or harm to our residents, even in the event of an emergency.
- A higher proportion of decent Council housing, with fewer empty homes going to waste.
- Improved satisfaction, with Council tenants better able to exercise their rights and access support to meet their responsibilities if they encounter difficulties.
- Council tenants are clearly able to influence Council decision making and see the positive consequences of their recommendations being implemented.
- Tenants spend less time waiting for responsive repairs or suffering from disrepair, with higher-quality estates and communal areas.
The plan for delivery is:
| Activity | Measure |
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Ensure the highest standards of health and safety compliance, monitoring the principal six safety measures: gas, fire, asbestos, legionella, lift and electrical compliance measures monthly to ensure they are maximised, and ensure compliance with all Building Safety Act and Fire Regulation requirements. Carry out spot checks and audits to ensure our information is accurate and improve our computer systems and integrated ICT architecture to add further assurance.
Work across services to ensure that adequate contingency plans including Personal Emergency Evacuation Plans (PEEPs), are in place.
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Percentage of homes that meet gas/ fire/ asbestos/ legionella/ lift/ electrical compliance and Awaab’s Law requirements.
Percentage of vulnerable residents with completed PEEPs
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Maintain and make good use of our council homes, undertaking a rolling programme of stock condition surveys to assess all of our housing units at least once every five years, from which we will prepare our Council Housing Asset Management Plan and Capital Programme to maintain homes at a decent standard and address emerging issues such as cladding, aging buildings, and minimum energy efficiency ensuring that this is affordable within our HRA Business Plan.
Ensure optimum use of our properties by minimising the number of empty and underutilised council homes, including void units waiting to be relet that are undergoing repairs, having appropriate regard to extensions and conversions when reasonable and affordable.
Review the incentives for tenants seeking to voluntarily downsize or relocate, where this would support more efficient allocation of the Council’s existing owned homes.
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Proportion of homes that do not meet the Decent Homes standard.
Number of empty/ void council homes.
Number of properties made available due to downsizing or tenant moves.
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Manage tenancies effectively, fairly and transparently, meet the Consumer Standards set by the Regulator of Social Housing.
Ensure that Flexible Tenancies are replaced with Secure Lifetime Tenancies, in line with our Tenancy.
Support victims of Anti-Social Behaviour including discrimination and hate crime and Domestic Abuse in line with our Policies.
Assist tenants and leaseholders struggling with the upkeep of their homes into more suitable, manageable accommodation.
Tackle tenancy fraud to recover Council properties for use by households in need.
Manage our council homes in a way that is inclusive and progressive towards members of protected equalities groups.
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Hounslow’s Regulator of Social Housing inspection grading
Number of Flexible Tenancies remaining
ASB cases opened per 1,000 homes
Number of tenants downsizing and leaseholder buybacks
Number of evictions due to tenancy fraud
Other measures broken down by equality category, where possible
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Listen and respond to our tenants’ concerns, promoting engagement activities with tenants, developing stronger relationships to amplify the voice of tenants, in line with our Engagement Policy.
Learn from customer feedback to improve customer satisfaction and our performance on complaints.
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Number of tenants participating in engagement activities
Complaints received per 1,000 homes;
Proportion of Stage 1/2 complaints responded to within timescales |
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Deliver an efficient, value for money repairs service, refreshing our commissioning arrangements with the Council’s wholly- owned delivery partner Coalo, to ensure these continue to represent best practice and value for money.
Review the end-to-end processes for business-critical repair activities, including voids, ensuring that they are optimised for delivery with appropriate escalations for damp and mould, cold homes and other circumstances covered by Awaab’s law.
Re-align grounds maintenance procedures to reflect the new Council Housing Asset Management Plan’s priorities and the updated estate improvement and caretaking practice in Tenancy Management.
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Proportion of emergency/non-emergency repairs carried out within target timescales
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The Private Rented Sector (PRS) is home to over one in four of Hounslow’s residents, housing a diverse range of households across all sections of demographic and housing need. This proportion is growing, with the PRS becoming a long-term housing solution for many of our most deprived and vulnerable residents, alongside a rise in insecure short-term tenancies, poor property conditions and persistent anti-social behaviour (ASB). Mindful of this, the Government is introducing its Renters’ Rights Bill to give private renters greater security and stability of tenure, to enable them to remain in their homes for longer, build lives within their communities and avoid the risk of homelessness. The improvement of property conditions and management of a new Decent Homes standard across the private sector is therefore a key priority of this Strategy, continuing the Council’s focus to target enforcement against the very worst properties, landlords and agents.
To address this priority, we will:
- Link across Council services to raise awareness of the new laws, including Awaab’s Law and the Decent Homes Standard, educating Private Rented Sector tenants and landlords on their rights and responsibilities.
- Support landlords with licensing and best practice, ensuring that there is a formal framework setting out clear and robust expectations for PRS landlords to follow.
- Enforce against landlords not meeting the new standards, taking action against those that break the law or place residents at risk through breaches of Health and Safety, particularly landlords of high-risk Houses of Multiple Occupation (HMOs) or illegal “beds in sheds”.
The benefits for residents will be:
- Tenants of private rented accommodation are educated, supported and empowered to assert their rights.
- Landlords of private rented accommodation in Hounslow aware of and respect their responsibilities towards tenants.
- Rogue landlords are held to account for poor practices or breaches of their tenants’ rights; PRS standards are raised through selective licensing, with well-run and managed properties that improve the safety and welfare of tenants.
The plan for delivery is:
| Activity | Measure |
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Link across Council services to raise awareness of the new standards, partnering Housing Standards and Housing Solutions and Independence to engage tenants and landlords, build knowledge and encourage compliance, particularly with the new Decent Homes Standard, reducing the need for enforcement, particularly around evictions where the impact will be felt the most.
Educate residents and PRS landlords on tenants’ rights at the point of properties being let, such as the new limits on bidding and rent in advance, the right not to exclude those who own a pet, those with children, or those who are on benefits.
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Number of homeless preventions due to landlord non-compliance, by reason.
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Support landlords with licensing and best practice, populating the new Private Rented Sector database to ensure quality data and high landlord compliance with mandatory registration.
Extend the licensing of all Houses in Multiple Occupation (HMO) in the borough before its expiry, in line with the Article 4 direction requiring all dwellings becoming HMOs to seek planning permission, to ensure that these are managed and developed in a sensitive and proportionate manner.
Investigate introduction of a selective licensing scheme to all of the borough’s Private Rented Sector properties.
Build on our partnerships with other services and agencies across the borough to enable a wider reach in effective enforcement against landlords and property managers who breach required standards and to investigate ASB associated with the PRS. Identify empty properties and offer the landlords advice and support to bring them back into the use, for the benefit of residents.
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Number of PRS properties on database
Number of HMO licenses determined
Number of selectively licensed PRS properties.
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Enforce against landlords not meeting the standard, taking action against those attempting illegal evictions, illegal lettings or advertising their properties with illegal conditions not consistent with the new requirements.
Ensure compliance with improvement and prohibition orders to effect the new PRS Decent Homes standard, taking action against landlords in breach of Awaab’s law or those with outstanding Housing Health & Safety Rating System (HHSRS) hazards, ensuring that all homes meet minimum standards of warmth, safety and decency.
Pursue the full range of civil penalties against rogue landlords and collect on their debts, to ensure that those in breach of the new standards are held responsible for the cost of funding council intervention.
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Number of landlord enforcement actions (not targeted) by type.
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Poor quality homes are damaging to positive life chances for our residents, and suitable, secure, high-quality housing is a necessary condition for successful health, social care, education and economic outcomes. At the same time, spiralling demand and strictly limited funding has led to extreme pressure on shared public-sector resources. Our One Hounslow ethos that we adopted in our Corporate Plan sets out how we are changing our approach to achieve the most with what we have: digital and data driven, mission-led and place based, co-designed with the wider community to focus on prevention and avoid costly interventions. Our Housing Service will work across the Council and in partnership with a full range of statutory, voluntary community partners to address housing need in the borough and so improve the lives of our residents.
To address this priority, we will:
- Work with partners to promote a One Hounslow approach to supporting residents to achieve successful outcomes, learning from each other and building on good practice, pooling resources where appropriate to achieve shared goals.
- Safeguard vulnerable residents, ensuring that we have procedures in place to mitigate the risks specific to groups that are disproportionately disadvantaged or affected by poor housing, including improving engagement and the offers for older persons and people with disabilities.
- Sustain independence through suitable accommodation, whether this is an offer of appropriate housing or adaptations made to an existing property, developing bespoke strategies to support the borough’s growing older population.
- Encourage safer, greener healthier neighbourhoods, seeking opportunities to tackle crime, the climate emergency and improve health through advancing the design of services and localities.
- Tackle inequalities and discrimination to create resilient, flourishing communities
The benefits for residents will be:
- A consistent, joined up approach to shared problems that enhances value for money for tenants and taxpayers.
- A tailored approach to housing needs that takes a holistic view of clients’ individual needs and vulnerabilities based on expert, specialist advice.
- Housing offers that are sensitive to the needs of disabled and elderly residents with comprehensive adaptations to help them remain in their own homes.
- Lower crime and anti-social behaviour, improved amenities and green spaces to create an improved living environment on and around housing estates.
- Fewer areas of ingrained generational inequality and poverty.
| Activity | Measure |
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Work with partners to learn from each other and build on good practice, including all Council directorates, other Local Authorities, Registered Providers of Social Housing, the Voluntary and Community Sector, statutory partners such as the Police, Probation, Fire Brigade, NHS and GPs, to address homelessness, rough sleeping, community and health issues on housing estates within the borough.
Better integration of data across all functions is key to joined up action.
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Delivery of joint KPIs from integrated strategies, e.g. reduction in Crime ASB, smoking or substance misuse interventions.
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Safeguard vulnerable residents, ensuring there are joint protocols for homeless, rough sleepers and tenant households to protect families with children, care leavers, persons with physical or learning disabilities, people experiencing mental health, substance misuse, or domestic violence issues.
Deliver efficient and effective Linkline and telecare services to residents who are vulnerable and at risk of falls in their homes, including residents of Council sheltered accommodation.
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Number of families in shared-facility
Bed & Breakfast accommodation for longer than 6 weeks Breakdown of households with disabilities in Temporary Accommodation / on housing waiting list.
Calls handled in time / residents assisted.
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Sustain independence through suitable accommodation, sourcing and allocating appropriate housing solutions for Extra Care and Sheltered residents, care leavers, young single parents, people with mental health and substance misuse issues, and rough sleepers.
Carry out adaptations to properties to enable people to remain in their homes, including enabling care at home, care of dependents with disabilities, and future proofing adaptations for the duration of residents’ lives.
Support foster care and shared lives initiatives within Children’s and Adults’ social care.
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Total number of Extra Care / Sheltered / care leaver / single parent allocations, allocations broken down by disability category.
Total number of homes adapted for Council tenants / residents
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Encourage safer, greener healthier neighbourhoods, seeking opportunities through co-production and (re)design to: reduce crime and Anti-Social Behaviour (ASB); increase energy efficiency to tackle fuel poverty for heating and cooling; improve health through better access to communal facilities and green spaces; tackle air and noise pollution; and encourage responsible waste disposal and recycling.
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Crime / Living Environment Indices of Major Deprivation for the neighbourhood of housing estates
(Crime/ASB per 1,000 households; Decent Homes, Central Heating, air quality and road traffic accidents) |
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Tackle inequalities to create resilient, flourishing communities, by addressing the socio-economic drivers of inequality, including housing, education, skills and employment.
Work with NHS and Public Health colleagues to tackle the Core 20 plus 5 health inequalities.
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Breakdown of relevant other measures by equalities category
Health and Wellbeing Core20plus5 measures
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We remain ambitious to regenerate and grow our borough through sustainable, high-quality, affordable development of mixed communities – but we must face harsh economic and financial realities in a climate that is adverse to the Council building more its own homes. Build cost inflation following Brexit and the Pandemic, higher interest rates increasing the cost of borrowing, and stricter building regulations mean that the price for building new council homes is increasingly prohibitive. Accordingly, we will adopt a creative and flexible approach, in partnership with a full range of private and social developers, to bring the additional homes that our residents and growing borough need. We will also refine our internal commissioning processes, to ensure that the homes we do build are closely matched and directed towards the borough’s existing housing need.
To address this priority, we will:
- Take a flexible, partnership approach to the development of new affordable homes.
- Call for new affordable homes to match Hounslow’s existing housing needs, including more homes for large families, genuinely disabled-adapted properties, and adequate provision for equalities groups including Gypsies and Travellers.
- Promote high quality, sustainable development that is aligned to Hounslow’s Local Plan, and the Mayor of London’s London Plan and London Housing Strategy.
The benefits for residents will be:
- The Council is a pragmatic development partner that is pro-growth, leading to more development in the borough, more units of additional housing and the economic benefits associated with this.
- Fewer households – such as large families and disabled – waiting years on the housing register for high-demand, low availability housing types.
- Liveable neighbourhoods that have consistent access to high-quality services and amenities.
| Activity | Measure |
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Take a flexible, partnership approach to the development of new affordable homes and regeneration, in consultation with our residents, working with a range of developers to realise additional units whether this is through building, purchase, or negotiation and planning permissions.
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Total number of new affordable homes secured, broken down by size and type.
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Call for new affordable homes to match Hounslow’s existing housing needs, coordinating the commitment of funds through the Housing Investment Group, to secure additional units of accommodation for larger families, households with disabled persons, Gypsies and Travellers; agreeing a Hounslow Housing standard for new affordable homes in the borough.
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Total number of new council homes delivered, broken down by size and type.
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Promote high quality, sustainable development that is aligned to Hounslow’s Local Plan, the Mayor of London’s London Plan and London Housing Strategy. Ensure that all new housing development has reasonable access to transport, healthcare, shops, schools and other amenities.
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Geographical barriers to housing Index of Major Deprivation sub-domain (units distance to GP, food shop, primary school, post office)
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