Background to FW2020

In July 2015 the Government surprised the Housing Association (HA) sector by reversing a ‘guarantee’ of increases in social housing rents of inflation plus 1 % and replacing it with 4 years of absolute decreases of 1 %. The cumulative effect by 2020 onwards is a decrease in our income of around 14 %.

At the same time the Government is also making other major changes affecting HA's including:

— Introducing the ‘Right to Buy’ (RTB) for HA tenants.

— Introducing a ‘Pay to Stay’ policy which means that ‘High Income Social Tenants’ (HISTs, to be defined as those where household income is above a minimum, which is likely to be 30 000 GBP in our areas) will be charged Market Rent rather than their current ‘social’ or ‘affordable’ rent levels. There will be a considerable onus on HAs to administer this scheme.

— Continuing reforms and funding cuts to the welfare benefits system which will have a major impact on the ability of our residents to pay and the processes by which we collect debt.

Our response to these changes involves a number of different projects and strands which we are pulling together under a single major change programme branded in FW2020.

First Wessex are looking to appoint a company to oversee the programme to deliver the results needed to achieve these targets.