Housing Regulation

The social housing sector is a highly regulated market. We have an expert team advising clients on all things housing regulation. Some examples of our experience are set out below. 

Regulator of Social Housing

We advise registered providers of social housing on all aspects of the Regulator of Social Housing’s regulatory regime, including:

• Economic regulation
  • Governance and Financial Viability Standard requirements and associated breaches / re-grades – see our Housing Governance page
  • Rent Standard both in terms of initial application and dealing with issues
  • Value for Money Standard requirements and how these interact with procurement and structures
• Consumer regulation
  • Obligations in respect of the Safety and Quality Standard and interaction with other health and safety obligations
  • Tenancy requirements
  • Information and engagement methods including consultation obligations and best practice
  • Dealing with vulnerable residents (including hoarding, domestic violence and requests for reasonable adjustments)
  • Policy requirements, including implementation and training
  • Awaab’s Law
• Disclosure obligations
• Inspections regime and enforcement powers, including the use of Performance Improvement Plans and voluntary undertakings
• ‘Distress’ management including interim financial and other support, transfer of assets, merger ‘rescues’ (see our Mergers page) and interaction with loan covenants and engagement with lenders to obtain waivers
• Housing Ombudsman powers and interaction

Health and Safety / Building Safety / Fire Safety / Statutory Compliance

We advise registered providers on all aspects of health and safety law, including the health and safety of employees and contractors as well as the health and safety of tenants. We also represent registered providers when incidents happen, in criminal investigations, prosecutions and inquests. Examples of our expertise include the following:

• Advising on the legal requirements and responsibilities for statutory compliance, including asbestos, legionella, gas, electric, lifts and fire.
• Advising on Awaab’s Law and what registered providers need to do to comply
• Advising on compliance with Decent Homes Standard requirements
• Representation at inquests including those following the death of an employee who was carrying out work in a residents home, the death of a tenant in a house fire, and the death of a number of tenants where damp and mould was considered as a potential causative factor in the death.
• We advise registered providers on compliance with the building regulations and the new building safety regime, including the specific requirements for higher-risk buildings. Our support covers both the design and construction of new and existing buildings and the management of occupied buildings.
• Representing registered providers in prosecutions by the police and health and safety executive.
• We provide engaging training around all of these issues to boards and management teams.

For more information, visit our Building & Fire Safety page. 

Information Law

• STAIRs
  • Complying with the requirements of STAIRS in terms of both proactive publication and responding to requests for information, including both legal, and strategic advice.
• Data Protection
  • Advice on compliance with the requirements of data protection law, including accountability, policies and procedures, requests from individuals, data sharing agreements, security requirements and marketing advice
• Sharing of data with regulators
• Cybersecurity and data breaches

Full details of the services offered by our dedicated information law team can be found here.

HR

• Whistleblowing investigations
• Competence and Conduct requirements
• HR issues arising from regulatory engagement
• Equality, diversity and inclusion
• Pensions
• Immigration

Safeguarding

As safeguarding is a fundamental part of governance and reputational risk management, we support providers with identifying their responsibilities and guiding them how to manage incidents. This includes ensuring they have robust policies and managing housing conditions and evictions safely. 

With safeguarding being everyone’s business, we guide providers as to the legislative frameworks relating to children and adults who may be at risk – recognising that housing is not excluded. 

Housing has part to play in community safety and public protection including issues relating to county lines; home invasion, cuckooing and residents with complex needs.

We recognise that a current trend for providers, and an area where support may be needed, is domestic abuse response and learning from Domestic Homicide Reviews alongside learning from other statutory reviews. 

Local Authorities

We support with advising on local authority corporate governance including vires and constitutional issues; conduct and ethical standards; complaints and investigations; information law (DPA/GDPR, FOIA, EIR and RIPA); governance and the democratic process (including technical elections issues); senior officer disciplinary and departures; and governance around shared services and outsourcing.

For more information please get in touch with David Kitson or Victoria Barman.