Agenda item

Report attached

The Sub-Committee received an update report on the position of the Housing Services resident safety and compliance programmes against its statutory and regulatory duties.

The report was presented as agreed by Cabinet on February 2022 that the overview and scrutiny sub-committee would be provided with regular reports on the housing compliance performance as part of the internal governance approach, performance was also scrutinised monthly by both the Compliance Board and the Asset Management Sub Steering Group.

The Sub-Committee were informed that the service had a duty to ensure every properties it manages are safe and meet all relevant statutory duties around testing and servicing equipment and meets the relevant consumer standards of the Regulator for Social Housing and the requirements of the Building Safety Act monitored by the new Building Safety Regulator.

The following six compliance areas were considered for resident safety: 

·         Gas Safety – all gas appliances be inspected annually and a Landlord Gas Safety Record (LGSR) provided.

·         Electrical Safety – all social rented properties to have and electrical inspection (EICR) every 10 years. It was stated that a recent regulation changed the requirement for private landlords to have 5 year inspections which is considered best practice in social rented properties and Housing services has adopted this approach.

·         Lift Safety – A monthly inspections and planned maintenance regimes and an annual certificate provided by the insurer.

·         Water Safety – all relevant water systems must be checked for legionella risk. All actions flowing from the legionella inspection must be completed within prescribed timescales.

·         Fire Safety – All relevant properties must have a valid Fire risk assessment (FRA) undertaken on a risk based approach which can be on a cyclical programme between 1 and 3 years. All actions flowing from the FRA must be completed within prescribed timescales.

·         Asbestos – under the asbestos regulations all communal areas must have a valid management level asbestos survey which must be held on a relevant asbestos register.

In addition, Members were informed that the service was completing a survey programme of all domestic properties to ensure all risk are managed appropriately, this is not however a statutory requirement under the asbestos regulations.

The Sub-Committee noted that alongside the main six areas Housing services have a duty to ensure compliance across a number of other associated areas such a PAT testing, lightening protection testing, Dry Riser testing and Fire alarm testing and as new properties are added to the portfolio the service also need to ensure areas such as sprinkler and communal extract systems are included in compliance programmes

It was stated that given the seriousness of resident safety all KPIs are set at 100% as shown in Appendix 1. Following a significant programme of work the service has been able to complete most programmes and ensure the relevant evidence was in place to support this position.

These figures appended to the report were for the January 2023, which is the latest available at the time need to submit this report, it was stated that figures would have changed slightly in February.

The Sub-Committee were informed that some new legislation introduced following the Grenfell Enquiry, The Fire Safety Regulations 2022, came into force.

The service is introducing additional checking regimes to ensure compliance, communal doors checked every 3 months and flat front entrance doors are checked every 12 months.

The legislation introduced some additional requirements around way finding signage, floor plans, lifts and essential firefighting equipment which the service is working to ensure compliance.

Members were informed that in order to achieve these requirements, the service was  looking to introduce a tool which would allow a 3D model of each of buildings, which will make identification of all relevant equipment, isolation of services and other relevant information.

Officers stated that once fully populated, the service would be able to share this data with the London Fire Brigade and residents as part of Housing engagement strategy. This would also be the core methodology for providing information to the new Building Safety Regulator as part of the building safety case file.  

The Assistant Director gave a brief demonstration of the tools.

The tool could also be used to circulate any information and things around fire safety campaigns and other relevant events for resident whereby ensuring the service communicate.

The Sub-Committee noted the report and demonstration.