Leo Stevens
Leo's interview
Leo discusses housing associations be better engaged in solving the temporary accommodation crisis and the innovation that members of TAN have already demonstrated. Watch his interview or read the transcript below to find out more.
How can housing associations be better engaged in solving the temporary accommodation crisis?
Housing associations have got a really important role to play in solving the temporary accommodation crisis. They're specialist housing people, and they've also got a lot of properties that potentially may not be suitable for social housing but could potentially be used as temporary accommodation, if we can find a way to unlock funding for other organisations to purchase and use them. At the moment, a lot of housing associations are looking to dispose of void properties that no longer meet their requirements, such as bringing them up to EPC standard or are in the wrong areas for them, and at the moment they're being sold on the open market or at auction but hopefully we can find a way to bring people together in such a way that these properties can be purchased by local authorities or investment or pension funds for example so that they continue to be used as temporary accommodation for people that need them.
What innovative approaches to managing temporary accommodation have members of TAN already discussed?
We've seen plenty of innovation already, one of the main ones is from Project 123 which has been set up by L&Q and this is looking to take land where perhaps it's not available for development immediately and use it as temporary accommodation, while using modular accommodation.
They've already done some preliminary studies and investigations and have identified a couple of sites where this can be used, they've also been in discussions with modular providers and hopefully we can bring some pilots together that see this coming to use and hopefully this can be something that other associations and local authorities can take forward.
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