Upcoming Events :
Seminar: Outsourcing and Contract Procurement
Tue 28 Feb 2012
Minerva House, 5 Montague Close, London, SE1 9BB
Social housing 'can play key role in delivering Cameron's Big Society'
Thu 26 Aug 2010
Social housing providers have been encouraged to embrace the values behind David Cameron's Big Society idea.
According to thinktank the Human City Institute (HCI), housing associations and local authorities should adopt a cooperative-style management approach.
The organisation stated by making residents more directly involved in the running of social homes, their self-esteem and satisfaction levels would increase.
HCI said this would in turn boost social mobility, as it could support their efforts to get jobs.
Dr Chris Handy, spokesman for the thinktank, stated that cooperative tenants are more likely to be in work than other occupants of social housing.
Figures from HCI show that the proportion of housing organisations in the UK that already adopt this style of management is relatively small when compared with other European countries and the US.
Cooperatives, community gateways, mutuals and tenant management organisations were said to account for less than one per cent of housing in Britain.
This comes after prime minister David Cameron suggested that occupants of social housing may be handed fixed period tenancies instead of a home for life.
