At the Chartered Institute of Housing Conference in Brighton, UK, on 10-11 May 2023 many salient and significant issues were brought to the fore on the housing fronts, both in the social and private sectors, and which bear relevance generally, beyond borders.
The principal tenor and object of the exhibitions and presentations had been the greener future agenda for housing, given the prevailing critical climate and ecological concerns.
An important aim is to improve existing homes through retrofitting, which means effecting the necessary structural, material modifications to make them more carbon efficient and more ambiently habitable, also making them more economic to run.
The LivGreen Retrofit company, for example, provides high quality retrofit services to both the social housing sector and to private landlords.
New buildings are already significantly more compliant, and the ones in the future will have far advanced in achieving decarbonisation targets. New future builds are predicted to produce 75-80 % less carbon emissions and raise their energy efficiency ratings.
The social housing decarbonisation topic has been vibrantly debated in Parliament recently.
As at May 2022, over half of the homes in England had an Energy Efficiency Rating below C. There is an urgency to improve on this, with the government firmly behind the efforts.
It is expected that by 2050, all UK homes will become net zero carbon compliant. Greater economic and social benefits are expected to accrue.
Among some of the measures underlying the greener future are:
- Protecting the natural environment
- Shifting to zero transportation emissions
- Accelerating solar and offshore wind power generation
- Intensifying and amplifying the focus on renewables and regeneration.
Green skills for the future
In the housing sector, accounting for carbon emissions commenced very recently. This process must become more extensive, pervasive and comprehensive, with a firm focus on scaling up carbon technologies.
Initially, incremental and small gains will lead to sizable and sustainable long-term benefits. Creative, innovative thinking, combined with belief and action, can bring about the desired transition.
A future skills plan for a greener environment in the housing context, entails addressing the current training and skills gaps. Close working with employers in this sector and with allied agencies would result in the requisite redesign of the curriculum and training programmes. Education and skills capacity building institutions already offer housing courses, whilst there is scope for further development in line with the greening agenda and the concomitant new competency skills acquisition.
The Phoenix Academy, for example, provides training to develop expertise in social housing, designed initially for residents, with a broader range of participants, from board members to housing contractors.
There are undoubted opportunities issuing from the social housing decarbonisation drive, in creating economically sustainable futures, generating employment prospects in the new green industries.
The Carbon Academy supports carbon literacy, bolstered by Carbon Champions.
Green skills for the future encompass technical competences, as well as organisational and professional competences. Greening organisations need to score highly on ethics, integrity, inclusivity and good governance, with an unwavering commitment, and the will to optimally apply the relevant technology and know-how.
Beyond a checklist or tick box exercise, residents in housing and communities themselves must play an active and inclusive role in creating a shared care culture and engage in collective efforts, so that meaningful and durable strides can be achieved in the home decarbonisation efforts.
A strengthened Social Housing Regulation seeks to empower residents and provide avenues for redress. Performances in the social housing sector will be published. Where serious lapses and shortcomings become apparent, de-registration can follow. The Housing Ombudsman will monitor compliance, issue codes of conduct and undertake complaints investigations.
The Centre for Social Justice(CSJ) and the Sustainability Research Institute(RSI) are significant reference points in the debate on homes decarbonisation, social sustainability, quality and equality issues in housing and living conditions.
The greening imperatives and homes decarbonisation projects aside, there are significant scopes for improvements in basic living conditions, direly needing attention, intervention and action, both in social housing and private rented accommodation.
Cases of abject states of disrepair, unsound structures, leaking roofs, unsafe electrical wirings and heating systems, serious dampness and moulds in rented homes are legion, and that have come to public notice though vociferous complaints, campaigns for reform and pressures for remedial action, media coverages spurring authorities and individuals concerned to respond and be held accountable.
According to a report, over 8 million people in Britain were deemed to be inadequately housed (The Guardian, September 2019).
As reported in ‘The Statesman, 4 September 2021’, a third of adults in Britain lived in unsafe and insecure housing, with new data revealing that 57% of black adults and 65% of single mothers were affected.
The 2017 tragedy of the Grenfell Tower fire, started by an electrical fault in a refrigerator, with the loss of many lives, pointed to unsafe cladding materials and deficient building regulations.
There is the tragic case of a 2-year-old boy, called Awaab Ishak, who died in December 2020 due to prolonged exposure to dampness in his home in Rochdale, a property managed by Rochdale Borough Housing. An Awaab’s Law followed, imposing a duty on accommodation providers to urgently address dampness in rented homes and to improve living conditions, as part of an amendment to the Housing Regulation Bill.
Moreover, housing managers must undertake the appropriate professional training and acquire mandatory housing qualifications and adhere to the defined housing codes of conduct and ethics.
In ensuring decent homes, Tenant’s Satisfaction Measures are an important step in ensuring and maintaining the desired standards, with the collection of relevant, meaningful and reliable data, as well as inputs from tenants, who can hold landlords to account. Housing policies must have clear societal impacts, with outcomes tangibly measuring up to the specified needs. Engaging with residents and the community are integral to the process, in ascertaining what matters to them on housing issues.
On the legal protection side, there is currently a move to do away with Section 21 of the 1988 Housing Act, providing landlords with the latitude of a no-fault eviction rule, if a tenant complains about disrepair issues, dampness or mouldiness.
The Renter’s Reform Bill is currently being introduced to give tenants more rights.
Against the vast scale of homelessness (presently estimated to be around 271,000 in England, over 125, 000 being children) the right to housing is a basic requirement. Particularly where resources are there, and state capacities pertain, housing the vulnerable members of society is not a discretionary concession but a policy imperative and a moral duty. After all, the Right to Housing is enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UHDR, adopted by the UN General Assembly in 1948).
Looking beyond the immediacy of homes, there are wider environmental and community regeneration issues to consider, with local inhabitants playing a vital role. The Green Spaces Advisory Board serves to free up congenial green spaces, through thought leadership and by fostering collaboration.
The Water Beach Barracks urban and civil project enabled the creation of 6500 homes over 76 acres for a diverse community, while fostering the following: woodland management, native planting, wildflower meadows, species-rich habitats, and green spaces.
Worth mentioning is the Windfell Centre for Environmental Recovery, with the acquisition of 296 acres of farmland in North Essex, leading to woodland creation projects, enabling biodiversity, all within a capital value and best practice model.
In the Greenwich Borough an innovative Energy Reduction trial scheme offers free energy monitors and the setting up of an energy community to share insights and tips.
The greening of neighbourhoods and the inculcation of greening mindsets and behaviours are paramount in mitigating the climate catastrophy. Building more unsightly and environmentally inimical structures at random would be injudicious and fraught with perils.
Nature is most deserving of TLC, tender loving care! Human nature, and all of life will be her beneficiaries.
Jeewan Ramlugun FRSA,CIHM.
Beyond bricks and mortar,
Beyond wattle and daub.
A shelter from the elements
on the hierarchy of needs
at the base it may happen to be,
taken for granted even,
yet without a protective canopy
the homeless in their shivering bone
know the true value
of a home, forgetting ownership
and equity issue;
beyond structure and shape
an abode is more than
the sum of its parts, solid
and substantial, an embodiment
of labour, of hopes, status
and prestige, such interests redundant
to those assembling only a roof
over the head, bread and (maybe)
butter,
or mere crumbs of sustenance secured;
and yet more is there to aim for
in the rendering of homes
greener, technically smarter
more in tune with nature,
fit for a threatened world,
home tending and nurturing
needing ever more attention,
intellects, enterprises, ingenuities,
in sum all critical faculties
marshalled to align
the forces of innovation
for a more durable, sustainable
future to be made possible,
while the street dwellers
do not lose sleep over such matters,
as those in mould-ridden
direly damp residences,
the hovels , the favelas ,
and the slum shacks
crave not for cosmetics
nor for any precious antiques
as only for decency they yearn,
lest a fragile failing life is too soon gone.