Blacklist for bad design

21 April 2006

As the Housing Corporation came under the government spotlight this week, chief executive Jon Rouse pledged to crack down on bad housing design by blacklisting housing associations and developers who consistently deliver poor quality.

Rouse, who faces the prospect of the corporation merging with English Partnerships, admitted the design of some of the schemes the corporation has funded under his leadership made him "wince". And he said he would "not hesitate" to blacklist the associations and developers who built them.

"We need to find out how those schemes went through the net," he said in an exclusive interview on the eve of the announcement of a government review of the corporation's role.

"Did they arise at the point we agreed the funding or did something change thereafter? Why didn't the planning authority play its role? Why was it allowed to be dumbed down from the point where we agreed the funding to what we actually see on site now?" he said.

"I saw one a couple of weeks ago… it was a social rented scheme and it was in the [Thames] Gateway and they had completely and totally changed the design in terms of the access to the apartments, and gone for an unbelievably cheap and crude solution."

Rouse said, in such a situation, he would ask his staff to investigate the association or developer's record and, if they found a pattern of poor design, consider removing the culprit from the corporation's list of development partners.

This is the strongest indication yet that the Housing Corporation, which will fund 84,000 new homes over the next two years, recognises the problem of poor design and is willing to take a hard line under Rouse, formerly chief executive of Cabe. But Rouse admitted he has been forced to temper his passion for good design since moving to the Housing Corporation, and said he was "afraid it would always be the case" that some poorly designed developments would slip through the net.

He said he was not able to factor the long-term benefits of good design into his cost calculations. "I only have so much to spend and obviously there are efficiency pressures continually in terms of trying to get more for less."

Cabe commissioner and former director of development at the Peabody Trust, Dickon Robinson, welcomed Rouse's hard line. "The fact he is keen to make an issue of this is encouraging," he said. "In the past, the Housing Corporation was really only concerned with numbers."

Robinson called on the government to develop a more sophisticated way of measuring the corporation's success that would take account of quality as well as quantity.

Rouse welcomed the review, announced by communities minister David Miliband on Wednesday, saying he was "genuinely excited" about the organisation's future.

"I've always believed that delivering communities needs to be thought of as a piece and I think institutional structures flow from that," he said. "This review gives us an opportunity to think about how things could work closer together and I think that's a really good thing."

The review will be run by an expert panel that will include the chairs and chief executives of both the Housing Corporation and English Partnerships as well as representatives from local government and lenders.

Get the latest stories first with BD newsletters. Click to signup
							WHAT ARE THESE?

| DISCUSS IN BD'S FORUM | SUBSCRIBE TO BD

---

We want to hear from you
You can be as critical or controversial as you like, but please don't get personal or offensive, and do keep it brief and relevant. Remember this is for feedback and constructive discussion!
Comments may be edited if they do not meet these guidelines.

Tell us what you think

You must fill in all fields marked *

Story date 21 April, 2006

This field is for security, please leave blank.

Your Name*

Your Email*

Comment*