View publication - Chartered Institute of Housing

PART ONE: LEARNING TODAY
greatest need. This also includes growing emphasis on conditionality, supporting selfsufficiency;
and generating capacity for social and economic mobility. It is likely that
whichever party forms the next Westminster government post 2015, housing providers
will have to reinforce their role as community development partners and enablers.
Growing commercial focus – The housing industry has become more self-conscious of
its commercial foundations. This has been accelerated by a combination of factors in
recent years including:
• Reductions in capital subsidy and a tougher affordable rent settlement.
• Sluggish bank lending as the wider economy gradually recovers from the banking
crisis.
• Enhanced economic regulation and a greater drive for value for money services and
more efficient asset management.
• The introduction of universal credit as a combined benefit paid directly to recipients
coupled with stringent benefit capping.
• Growing pressures on the industry to source alternative funding, for example, from
capital markets in the form of bond finance.
While these commercial drivers are not antithetical to the social vision of housing
providers, they are transforming the business of organisations which have evolved from
public, social or philanthropic origins. Housing organisations are looking to redefine their
values and goals and are asking if they have the right people, with the right knowledge,
skills and behaviours in the right positions of governance and leadership to steer them
towards a more commercially focused future.
Greater diversification in the housing industry – There is a dramatic shift taking
place in the housing industry which is moving the conversation concerning the role and
purpose of affordable housing away from a crude dichotomy between achieving social
value and business value. In varying degrees, housing providers are seeking out and
maximising new commercial opportunities to deliver, support and enhance their offer to
communities; and they are looking at ways to take communities with them on this new
journey. Many housing organisations are already diversifying their business portfolios:
(e.g. some are managing academies, delivering community enterprises, supporting
apprenticeships, community skills and training, publishing newspapers, running local
radio stations and engaging with an increasingly wide spectrum of community partners).
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