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Consultation on Guidance for new housing allocation regulations

 “The Localism Act gave local authorities powers and responsibilities to local authorities to revise criteria for the allocation of social housing. What the government hopes councils will do is summed up in this quote from the foreword to the consultation -
“The guidance makes clear that we expect social homes to go to people who genuinely need them, such as hard working families and ex-servicemen and women, and not to those who do not – such as people who already own a home that is suitable for them to use.”

This consultation and the following statutory guidance will have a big impact on many potentially vulnerable people with whom you as organisations work or advise. You may well have opinions on the draft guidance and how it will affect your clients or potential clients. See the consultation on the Department for Communities & Local Government website. You have until 30th March to reply to housingreform@communities.gsi.gov.uk.
A lot of the guidance deals with very technical issues such as  defining what an allocation is and also sets out eligibility criteria based on nationality, immigration status and habitual residence. There is a particular instruction that where councils adopt a residency test as part of their criteria this must not apply to people who have been in the armed forces within the last 5 years. The government has produced draft ‘secondary legislation’ on this.

Council’s allocation schemes must give a preference to:

  1. people who are homeless (within the meaning of Part 7 of the 1996 Act)
  2. people who are owed a duty by any housing authority
  3. people occupying insanitary or overcrowded housing or otherwise living in unsatisfactory housing conditions
  4. people who need to move on medical or welfare grounds, including grounds relating to a disability, and
  5. people who need to move to a particular locality in the district of the housing authority, where failure to meet that need would cause hardship (to themselves or others).

 As well as this:

Schemes should consider (my emphasis) giving additional preference in the scheme to people with urgent housing need:

Councils can also have criteria to determine allocations between otherwise equal preference or priority such as:

Many of the fundamental principles remain the same as current housing law  but  the difference will be in how councils implement the new flexibilities – they have more discretion; they MAY include much more but  HAVE To include less. You can see the consultation on the Department of Communities & Local Government website. The deadline for responses to housingreform@communities.gsi.gov.uk is 30th March.
Stephen Blann, Policy and Networks Officer

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National Audit Office review of government implementation of the Compact

The National Audit Office recently conducted a review of central government departments’ implementation of the Compact. They found that whilst there was commitment to the Compact across most departments there were different approaches and levels of understanding. There also appeared discrepancies between the number of complaints on non-compliance departments thought they had, and the number that civil society organisations had actually made. Not having a single body identifiable as being responsible for promoting the Compact - including good practice support – was a weakness. The NAO also had concerns over the effectiveness of Compact Monitoring – though it also felt the broad nature of the commitments makes monitoring and evaluation difficult. You can download the report at - http://www.nao.org.uk/publications/1012/national_compact.aspx

The report has the following recommendations:
For departments

  1. Departments need to strengthen their implementation of the Compact by taking a more systematic approach to its oversight. Appendix Two to this report sets out examples of approaches that departments could use, tailored to their particular circumstances and priorities. Specific areas on which departments may wish to focus on include making sure:
  1. Departments should be more active in seeking and sharing examples of good practice with each other.
  2. Departments should make sure that future consultations meet either the 12-week consultation period, or if they will not, that they provide a clear explanation as to why this is the case.
  3. Departments should review their complaints procedures to make sure issues relating to the Compact are sent to the relevant team with oversight of its implementation.
  4. Departments should make sure that the rationale for funding decisions is clear to civil society organisations.
  5. Departments should consider commissioning periodic reviews of the Compact by, for example, internal audit.

For the Office for Civil Society

  1. The Office for Civil Society should set out its areas of responsibility for the Compact. Specifically, it should set out its role with regard to supporting departments and for identifying good practice.
  2. The Office for Civil Society should identify scope to convene a forum (for example, through face-to-face meetings or online) of departmental representatives with responsibilities for the Compact in order to identify and share good practice and consider the merit in an annual cross departmental meeting, possibly including ministers.
  3. The Office for Civil Society, possibly by commissioning an external organisation such as Compact Voice, should review the Compact relevant elements of the 2012-13 departmental Business Plans to identify and then disseminate areas of good practice.

 An appendix to their report sets out a range of implementation and evaluation tools that are (or could be) used by departments these are set out below. Some of these are already being used by Champions and organisations or could be used by the Steering Group as part of its monitoring and evaluation of Compact implementation and impact. 

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Consultation on draft Guidance for producing Joint Strategic Needs Assessments and Health & Wellbeing Strategies

The Department of Health (DH) has produced draft guidance on how Joint Strategic Needs Assessments should be conducted and the new Health & Wellbeing Strategies   proposed in the Health & Social Care Bill.

You can see the draft Guidance on the DH website together with a response form - Download question form and you can respond to jsnaandjhws@dh.gsi.gov.uk.  Deadline for comments is 17th February.

The context of this consultation is a little odd. The DH says that formal guidance cannot be produced until the Health & Social Care Bill is passed. But if draft guidance is not produced now, there will not be time for local health and wellbeing boards to be operational and Health & Wellbeing Strategies to be produced by the April 2013 deadline. Further, so that the consultation can be conducted to affect the Bill, the deadline for comments is 17th February. This does not appear a very compact complaint approach, although it is stated that there will be a short public consultation in the Spring.

 

Building Capabilities for Impact and Legacy

Helping VCS organisations and social enterprises to become more effective will continue to be a priority for BIG over the next few years.
To develop our thinking, we have published a discussion paper. This paper is for voluntary sector and social enterprise managers working in both frontline and infrastructure support and development organisations. It sets out our approach to ‘building capabilities within voluntary organisations’, and gives an opportunity for voluntary and other organisations to influence this approach.
This is your chance to have your say. This paper can be viewed on our website, along with an online survey. The survey will run until 15 March 2012, and will help us to decide how best to allocate at least £20 million over the next three years in this area of work.

Statutory register of Lobbyist Consultation

The summary in the consultation is, “This consultation seeks views from the public and industry on how the proposed register of lobbyists should work. It asks for comments on: the definition of a lobbyist; who should be required to register; what information should be collected about them and the companies on behalf of which they lobby; and how the register should be funded”  
One issue that has arisen is whether charities and trade unions will have to join the register. This obviously raises issues about the role of voluntary and community groups’ role in the democratic process – and whether it should be seen as different from commercial lobbying interests. See the consultation on the Cabinet Office website. There is also an Impact Assessment. The closing date for comment is 13th April.

National Planning Policy Framework

Two new parliamentary publications have been published on the National Planning Policy Framework:

  1. Communities and Local Government select committee report
  2. House of Commons briefing note

(Source:  NAVCA LINx bulletin)

Child Poverty, figures for your area

The Campaign to End Child Poverty has published new figures that provide a child poverty map of the whole of the UK. The figures are broken down by parliamentary constituency, local authority and ward.
(Source:  NAVCA LINx bulletin)

Patient and public engagement case studies

Last year 25 emerging Clinical Commissioning Groups were awarded funding by the Department of Health to run a range of Patient and Public Engagement projects. Case studies have recently been published to outline some of those projects and any lessons learned.
(Source:  NAVCA LINx bulletin)

Personal Independence Payment: assessment thresholds and consultation

The Department for Work and Pensions has published its draft proposals on entitlement levels for PIP Mobility and Daily Living Allowance. The Department is keen to hear views from all interested parties but in particular from disabled people and disability organisations.

Panel on the Independence of the Voluntary Sector

The Panel on the Independence of the Voluntary Sector has produced the first of five annual reports on the independence of the voluntary sector - Protecting Independence: the Voluntary Sector in 2012. The panel has identified six elements, which, if not properly understood and tackled, they think could undermine independence, particularly parts of the voluntary sector, which will continue to depend on an element of public funding. They are:

The Panel examine these issues with reference to their Barometer of Independence determined as part of the consultation on the Panel’s work.
The panel also look specifically at the Work Programme and noted that:

The report concludes by saying:
“The sector itself needs continually to evaluate the risk to its independence and have the confidence to engage with statutory and private providers, relying upon its long expertise and deep knowledge of those it works with and for…
We will be looking for:

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