Hillingdon plans to close its ALMO

Hillingdon will become the first local authority in the country to close its arms length management organisation (ALMO) and return housing management to the council.

The ALMO Hillingdon Homes was established in 2003 and has a history of delivering good services, but councillors in the authority’s cabinet took the decision to bring management back into the council, after considering a report that included a “test of opinion of council housing tenants and leaseholders”.

An independent test of opinion with residents was run at the end of last year. From the postal survey, of which there were 1,249 responses, 942 were in favour of returning housing management to the council. Only 44 were opposed and 251 indicated that they did not mind either way. There were 12 not stated.

The random telephone survey, which was statistically representative of all tenants and leaseholders, managed to contact 1,300 residents of whom 610 were in favour of returning to the council, only 57 were opposed and 582 did not mind either way.

Since it was established, Hillingdon Homes has delivered good service performance, earning itself two stars from the Audit Commission, and high tenant satisfaction. A substantial stock investment programme has secured the Decent Homes standard utilising £60 million funding from Government. Now this programme is complete, Hillingdon Council has been looking at the best way of further improving services for residents as well as where money can be saved.

For tenants and leaseholders there will be no change in ownership – the council will set the rents in line with Government guidelines and arrange repairs and consult with residents about housing services.

Savings from support service costs and governance will be used to enhance services. On return, the council will be working to make more efficiencies in the future and improve linkages to other council services.

The council believes that it would be best for tenants and the service to secure an early return to the council and is discussing this with Hillingdon Homes whose Board will meet in early March to consider this.

All Hillingdon Homes staff will move to the council and retain their current terms and conditions. It is expected that post-return, support services will be integrated with those already at the council.

Councillor Philip Corthorne, cabinet member for adult social care, health and housing, said: "Hillingdon Homes has done a good job of managing the council's tenancies but we have had to look at how we continue to provide good quality, efficient services for residents. Changes in flexibilities and freedoms promised by the Government for ALMOs have not materialised but freedoms around borrowing and new build have been extended to local authorities.

"We have had to deal with the impact of the economic recession and severely restricted budgets means we cannot justify running a separate company to manage housing when we could do it in-house. This proposal will mean we could cut duplicated costs and instead use the money to improve housing services."