On Saturday 26th October, residents from across Lambeth, including a representative from PRERA, were invited to join a Residents’ Assembly 2024, hosted by Lambeth Council.
What is a Residents Assembly?
The Lambeth Residents Assembly was a half day event held at Lambeth Town Hall to allow residents and TRAs to provide direct feedback on Estate Services, Repairs, and Homeownership Services, and to collaborate with service departments to suggest ways to improve housing services.
Pre-COVID they were held annually, however our understanding is that they have not been held since 2019. Lambeth hope to make them annual again, but haven’t committed to that. Darren Irish only started in February and is tasked with setting up all these Resident Engagement structures up again after they got abandoned during COVID. Lambeth have also mentioned a Tenant Assembly and a Homeowner Assembly planned for the future, but only time will tell.
Summary from our PRERA rep.
Interactive workshops were held on Estate Services and Repairs. There were also resident
drop-in surgeries with Community Works, Responsive Repairs, Serco and Wates.
Serco: External cleaning, weeding of hard services, and refuse and recycling services (external contractor)
Pinnacle: Internal cleaning inc. windows and walkways (external contractor)
Community Works: External building and grounds repairs (internal Lambeth department)
Wates: Internal property repairs (external contractor)
Lambeth Landscapes: Grass cutting and Autumn leaf collection.
An interactive workshop was held with the Community Works communal repairs team, where they explained the service had been brought fully in-house to improve the service. It was noted by residents that communal repairs are difficult to report, as there are often crossed wires when trying to explain issues to the call centre, and the call centre trying to raise the right job with the right team. A new and improved online reporting system for communal repairs is being slowly rolled out and will be in operation in early 2025.
Conversations were held with Lambeth Contract Managers about a Serco scrutiny panel that will be starting around February, which PRERA will take part in, to address some ongoing issues around rubbish and fly tipping on the estate and weeding of hard surfaces.
The Estate Services workshop focussed on drawing up new estate action plans. However, it
was noted by residents that current estate action plans are out of date, haven’t been
delivered, and are aspirational with no funding to deliver them – so it was not clear what the
purpose of the exercise was. PRERA are taking a different approach of working closely with
Housing Officers to better understand which opportunities for the estate are realistic and
have funding available. However, this is a long and complex process.
Overall, the Assembly was a good opportunity for PRERA to build relationships with key
Lambeth housing staff, as we continue to figure out how to best navigate various teams and escalation processes within the Council.
Like to get involved?
If you have skills or time that could help in our efforts to improve housing governance and the quality of the services our estate receives please get in touch.