It’s HQN’s 25th anniversary! CEO Alistair McIntosh and company subordinate Max Salsbury were forced to speak to each other in the hope of forging an informative and interesting feature…
A lot’s happened since HQN’s inception in 1997: the rise of Tony Blair’s New Labour, Princess Diana’s death, 9/11, the War on Terror, Brexit, Trump, Covid, the ascension of the avocado *.
Alistair is 61 this year but doesn’t look a day over 60. Why did he start HQN in the first place? “We were coming to the end of compulsory competitive tendering and there had been a long period of underinvestment in council housing. It seemed possible that Labour were going to win the election. So, David Garland and I brought people together to design a system for regulating housing that promoted quality and investment, rather than cutting things back and privatising.”
I ask if he feels any pride: “No. Because from 2010 onwards it was totally torn apart. There was a system for improving the management for housing, there was investment. You could walk around and if you saw an estate that was unkempt you phoned the director of housing, and it was sorted out very quickly. You didn’t have Kwajo Tweneboa in those days – and Kwajo’s a really clear sign of how far we’ve fallen.
“So, you can take no pride in the last ten years. I walk round estates all the time. They need money spending on them; sometimes the management’s good but often it’s utterly shambolic – and that’s directly attributable to the people who removed inspections. Inspection has its flaws, but the baby was thrown out with the proverbial bathwater.”
Government Grant
Inspections: a very sore spot for Alistair. Now’s a good time to bring up his least favourite housing minister in HQN’s lifetime: that would be Grant Shapps. “Unquestionably the worst. I understand why he took a dislike to the sector: they’re socialistic, they’re vocal, they set out to provoke the Conservatives. They shouldn’t be surprised when they get a reaction. But he should’ve been the bigger man and repurposed inspection to deliver his agenda.
“I think he showed himself up to be a very small individual. You don’t have to respond to provocation every time it comes along, and you’ve got to look at the bigger picture.”
“For me, honesty moves you to the absolute top of the class”
So much for Shapps. But which housing minister, out of the 20 we’ve had since 1997, has impressed Alistair the most? “I think the best and most honest was [Nick] Raynsford: he got to grips with a whole range of issues, and he admitted later that they wished they’d built more homes and not just protected the ones they had. For me, honesty moves you to the absolute top of the class.”
The scuttling of inspections aside, in what other areas have the country’s boss class damaged the sector? “The biggest mistake government makes is to take a decision, often a sensible decision, and then not review it as matters unfold.
“I arrived from Glasgow in the 1980s. The private rented sector was on its knees. It was down to a single digit percentage of homes in Camden. Terrible conditions. So, obviously something had to be done to revive the PRS. Billions were spent on tax breaks to get it going – but today you can see the damage the prevalence of buy-to-let has done, and the government is now taking action to clamp down on buy-to-let landlords.
“At any point in the last 20 years we could’ve had a good look at that and put the brakes on. I think that’s a classic example of fixing a problem, thinking it’s solved and then waking up 20 years later and realising ‘blimey, we should’ve looked at that as we went along’.”
At this point we take a break – or at least we probably should’ve done. We plough on instead.
RTB or not RTB
What about the Right to Buy, I ask: have your views on it changed? “The RTB in the 1980s was absolutely the correct policy, there’s no ambiguity about that. Many council tenants had been in their properties a long time and they’d spent more on rent than their owner-occupied peers paid on mortgages: they deserved the break from government.
“The current RTB…” [Alistair sighs wearily].
“Cameron’s huge mistake was in not listening to his own housing advisor in 2010 and insisting on house price stability. The RTB today just doesn’t fly. It cuts social housing; it doesn’t replace it with new homes. I was in a London borough the other day where 44% of former RTBs are now privately rented out. The world has moved on. We need to change.”
And now we discuss without doubt the most devastating event to hit the sector in living memory: Grenfell. How much of an impact has it had – and how likely are we to see a similar tragedy?
“I walk past a lot of blocks with timber fascias and a lot of balconies with rubbish on them. There’s almost no housing management going on at many estates. Evidence? The way people park across the fire brigade gates. So, I think there’s a possibility it could happen again.
“Cameron’s huge mistake was in not listening to his housing advisor in 2010 and insisting on house price stability. The RTB today just doesn’t fly. It cuts social housing; it doesn’t replace it with new homes”
“There’s a huge skill shortage in the country. Have we got the right people working on these jobs? There isn’t enough investment going in. The Grenfell Inquiry has been going on a very long time. I think it’s doing magnificent forensic work but all the time it’s doing that forensic work the memory of Grenfell is fading.
“If Grenfell was a watershed moment, why does the government have to introduce regulation on quality and safety for the sector? Surely, if Grenfell mattered [housing providers] would’ve done it for themselves and left the government trailing in the slow lane.”
And he also feels that the inquiry’s deep analysis has exposed how far the sector still has to go: “There’s not been any significant move forward in professionalisation, which is very poor indeed, and I just don’t see the same sea change in housing that I saw in the oil industry after Piper Alpha.”
Looking ahead
The sector is already beset by serious issues, but does HQN’s chief anticipate further grave issues in the future? Sadly, it’s a yes.
“I think it’s almost certain that the green agenda is finished. They’re switching on the coal-powered stations all over the world. Thatcher got rid of it [the green agenda], Blair got rid of it, Cameron got rid of it, and now it looks like Johnson is going to bin it too.
“We’re in a pickle and the problem that brings is floods, bad weather, all manner of damage to the housing stock. So, I don’t think we’re going to spend much on net zero and we will reap the inevitable harvest of storms from it. It’s a big, big issue on the horizon.”
Not terrifically optimistic so far, is it? What if Labour win the next election? Are there grounds for believing that result would be good news for the sector?
“The Grenfell Inquiry has been going on a very long time. I think it’s doing magnificent forensic work but all the time it’s doing that forensic work the memory of Grenfell is fading”
“Well, they’ve not said a lot, have they? I think their heart would be in the right place, but I remember speaking to a south London Labour MP about inspections and investment, and what he said then was ‘it’s payback for our people.’ Now, that was a very moderate Labour MP and I’m not hearing a statement as strong and invigorating as that from anyone at the moment.
“A lot of folks are getting behind the private tenants because they’re more numerous, they’re well-connected, they’re getting stories in the Spectator and the Telegraph on a very regular basis, but I’m not seeing ‘payback for our people,’ and that’s what we need from Labour.
“Having said that, I see a lot of councillors from many parties when I do sessions for local authorities and they’re all fine people with good intentions – I just wish they got to the top of their respective parties and had more influence.”
Priorities
And what if HQN’s boss was the CEO of a housing association – what would be his top three priorities?
“Reputation, reputation, reputation. You talk to the best associations; they’ve got their top people working on dealing with complaints and tackling the big issues. They’re walking around the estates, they’re talking to the frontline, they know what’s coming up, they’re connected to local politicians. That’s absolutely the way to do it.
“You’ve got to sort the money out, that’s a basic requirement. There are some big issues coming up on the rent increase; no one is going to get away with inflation plus hikes for tenants or shared owners so that’s going to put a lot of business plans into a very dark hole – but the number one priority at the moment is reputation. Because some of the housing associations are rolling out the red carpet for private equity with the way they’re conducting themselves.”
I ask him if he thinks it’s a good idea for caps on sector CEO pay. However, he mishears me. “Cats?” he asks, puzzled. I correct the error but regret it now as it would’ve have been interesting to find out what impact cats might have on housing. Anyway, caps on CEO pay:
“There are some big issues coming up on the rent increase; no one is going to get away with inflation plus hikes for tenants or shared owners so that’s going to put a lot of business plans into a very dark hole”
“If you’re a tenant, these people are grossly overpaid. But for most tenants they’d be grossly overpaid on even lower amounts. You read all this stuff about train drivers and folk are going berserk that they earn £50,000 a year. The RMT could argue that’s not enough to keep a family in London. So, one man’s meat is another man’s poison on salaries. Caps are a seductive idea, but I think there’s no cap that’s going to satisfy residents or politicians and we do need to keep an eye on other industries.
“I understand the resentment and it’s part of reputational management. A CEO I knew used to look at what everyone else was paid per home and put himself in the middle. And that was 20 years ago.”
There’s a proposed new inspection regime in the wings. What are Alistair’s hopes and expectations for it?
“I hope it’s that they never have to leave the office in anger. What I hope is that the sector will get its whatsit into gear, run its own inspections and quality control, talk to Kwajo and others, and reclaim a reputation for quality. What government has to do is make sure organisations have the money to close the investment gap. There are quite a few local authorities, and quite a few housing associations too, that will be in difficulties if rents don’t go up by inflation plus, and they’re not going to go up by inflation plus because inflation is so high.
“Government needs to help with investment because there are many landlords who don’t have the resources to produce standards of management and maintenance that’d satisfy the expectations of any reasonable regulator.
“I think we’ve got to put our house in order – input from the regulator is welcome, but our ambition should be to keep them in their barracks because we’re doing so well, and their job needs to be to get investment into the sector.”
But how does he expect to see it rolled out on the ground? Is it going to be properly resourced? “Every inspection regime relies on harvesting good practice. So, it’s our job to develop good practice; their job to decide what suits and appeals to them, and then they go out and look at it. But is the genie out of the bottle? Are people going to go straight to Kwajo? It’s very easy to see how he can grow that into a Jack Monroe, Martin Lewis-style enterprise.
“I don’t think we’re going to spend much on net zero and we will reap the inevitable harvest of storms from it. It’s a big, big issue on the horizon”
“It’d be a very foolish landlord that looked only at the regulator and who wasn’t cognisant of what was happening on social media or in other industries.”
HQN had a big part in the creation of the ALMO movement, which has subsequently gone through many cycles since then, what…Alistair hurriedly cuts me off: “It finished in 2010. We have to accept the ALMOs and HQN as they were died in 2010, and people need to come up with a plan B to achieve the same overall objective.”
But are there lessons we could all learn from pre-2010? Alistair wearily considers: “Some ALMOs are better than others. Some of the investments stood the test of time, some didn’t – but you could say that about anything, couldn’t you? Time moves on.”
Levelling schmucks
Now, you may have noticed that the government’s all about going around the country and ‘levelling up’ these days. What’s Alistair’s take on this phenomenon, which sounds a little bit like a new dance craze. “There was so much rubbish talked during Covid, wasn’t there? ‘Spiritual renewal’, people being able to work from the internet…have you tried to use the internet in the country? It’s useless in a lot of the country! People sitting in London talking about ‘levelling up’ make me laugh, as they have no idea of what the realities are like for people working in the rural areas of England and Scotland as I have done for many years.
“It was no surprise to discover that GDP was booming ahead in London, far ahead of the rest of the country since we came out of Covid. I think if we carry on as we are we’ll get what we’ve always got: the south will pull away and eventually, I think, we’ll become more concerned about London going independent than Scotland.”
“I see a lot of councillors from many parties when I do sessions for local authorities and they’re all fine people with good intentions – I just wish they got to the top of their respective parties and had more influence”
In 2047, HQN will be celebrating its 50th. What’s the very least Alistair would hope for by then? “I’d hope that social housing would become the best tenure in terms of quality. I’d hope it had social mix. I’d hope that it was sufficiently big enough to have accommodation for everyone who wanted it. Maybe you’d look at rents in relation to earnings. A big, prosperous sector that people aspired to live in.”
More gloomily, what serious problems does he anticipate for the sector? “I think people are going to try to cut their way out of problems and trash their reputations, or they’re going to try and trade their way out of problems, and they don’t have the experience or wherewithal to do that.”
Ups and downs
It’s getting late. I want to go and get a vegan sausage roll. I ask Alistair his deepest regret. “I think I took 2010 too badly. I should’ve either gone completely or stayed with more enthusiasm, and I sort of did neither.”
Ok, that’s a little maudlin. Personal highlight? “Seeing the extra investment and the push for customer care across the ALMOs and the better housing associations.”
“There are some big issues coming up on the rent increase; it’s going to put a lot of places into a very dark hole financially – but the number one priority at the moment is reputation”
And that’s the end of that. I had no time to ask about the meaning of life, favourite Anthrax album or if he believes in ghosts. Maybe next time.
(*Alistair has returned to mock inspection estate visits. On his travels he saw six avocados for a pound at Ridley Road Market in Dalston, yet they cost more than a pound each at the M&S opposite. Luckily for Alistair, a chip shop was available!)
