As Liverpool council's executive member for housing, Kemp is steering the project as part of a strategy to divest the city of its landlord role, tackle the chronic housing problems that beset it, and start rebuilding communities that have been getting the rough end of policy for too long. In particular, Liverpool council is keen to use transfers both as a lever for change, and to achieve much wider economic aims.
The plans are grandiose in scale. Liverpool Housing Trust and Riverside Housing are the partners earmarked to take over some 14,000 homes across three areas, provided tenants agree in a ballot next March.
The transfers will need a £4.5m dowry and eventually only 9,800 of the homes will remain. Up to 700 homes knocked down before the vote will release extra land for private sector and mixed-use developments. The three-locally based subsidiaries of the associations will spend £150m on improvements to the rest.
The Norris Green area is to get special attention to deal with 1,500 defective Boot houses. LHT has won backing from residents to clear the whole site, much to the trust's relief.
In its place are plans to build a new village centre surrounded by mixed housing and improved transport. The partnership has asked the DTLR and English Partnerships to designate the project a Millennium Village.
So far, so good. But those involved see the Eastern Fringe as something far greater than a housing solution. The council is pressing registered social landlords to become general service providers, to handle neighbourhood management, and some-times to take over roles it traditionally fulfilled itself.
Kemp says: "That is the big prize. But it can only be done once you have a critical mass. So we are transferring as much as possible to RSL partners."
Among the council's moves in support of its strategy is a controversial step that harks back to pre-private investment days for housing associations. Liverpool has zoned, or approved, certain RSLs to work with the council in particular areas. In the neighbourhoods adjacent to the city's eastern fringe, for example, it aims to trickle-transfer empty homes to LHT and Riverside to improve integration across areas and further boost the desired critical mass.
LHT chief executive David Bebb is enthusiastic about diversifying but warns that RSLs must gain the necessary skills to deliver such a role. They have gradually come to the realisation that neighbourhood management is as important as housing, but their history has inevitably meant their expertise lies primarily with the latter.
His own association has built health centres, got involved in community development, and worked on neighbourhood information technology centres.
Even so, the activity was not linked tightly enough to the neighbourhood, he believes. "We have been opportunity-driven and not focused enough," he says.
"One big lesson we have learned is that whatever you do on ancillary things, market forces can still blow you away. Now we are looking at markets strategically, and avoiding tackling neighbourhoods in isolation. The danger is you will just suck people and demand from one area to another. An overall view is crucial."
It is undeniably true that Liverpool has a large number of RSLs, and when the Housing Corporation and others suggest 50 or so is too many; some get worried for their future existence.
Bebb says that view stems from a misreading of the sector. With about 35,000 homes, RSLs hold a fifth of the total housing stock – more than in any other English district. That means there is room for all, he argues, and the huge activity generated by the city's RSLs should not be undervalued.
Some exchanges of stock are in the pipeline, while many more are likely to come under management agreements to give tenants the best local service. With changes mooted to the rules restricting council activity, Kemp has floated the idea of joint ventures to manage stock.
Though Merseyside is still its home, Riverside has spread its wings elsewhere in recent years, notably through transfers and merger. It says its new group structure places it perfectly to create local subsidiaries such as the two for the Eastern Fringe.
A spokesman explains: "It enables local communities such as Netherley and Valley, and Dovecot and Deysbrook to take substantial control of their own futures, with the added support of a long-established parent in the background.
"The future for both the central and southern parts of the Eastern Fringe lies very much in the hands of its tenants."
Nevertheless, Liverpool's oversupply of housing suggests some RSLs will come under pressure as their stock is demolished. Bebb sees the process underway in the Eastern Fringe as another means of bolstering RSLs by giving them a chance to replace ageing and redundant stock of their own.
"Ours is the strongest RSL sector in the country and it was important not to undermine it through stock losses," he says.
"The city's transfer plans are designed to help with replacement, not allowing us to be weakened through market changes."
Kemp admits that though the problems in the Eastern Fringe are sometimes daunting, they are nothing compared to those of the city centre where conditions are described by researchers as "chaotic".
"We have gone for sorting out the Eastern Fringe first because it is the simplest," he says candidly. "It will make an excellent contribution to our strategy, particularly in getting rid of oversupply. But we couldn't wait for proposals to emerge for dealing with the whole city. By the time we had that, the conditions would have changed."
Among the attractions the area holds are steady housing markets with relatively high prices nearby. The idea is to tap into that stability, building mostly higher value housing for sale plus whatever social housing is needed.
For its part, the council has embarked on a private finance initiative to get 21 schools upgraded across the city. Several are in the Eastern Fringe, helping to secure the services and infrastructure that people will want to see when choosing to live there.
There is also an employment strategy, agreed with the European Union which part funds it, located at "key points of market intervention" including two Eastern Fringe areas. The council will put in social housing grant and hopes the Housing Corporation will reciprocate.
The council sees its investments as issues of "super-profit". As land and property values rise, its assets in the area will become increasingly saleable, releasing funds for other areas in turn.
LHT has no qualms about building for the well off in a city where the great majority of the housing is in council tax bands A and B. With Riverside and a private developer it is already building 200 of the most prestigious apartments in the city on the waterfront.
"High value housing is needed in the city," he says. "As to us doing it: the purpose is to make money for LHT. We have diversified strongly into other businesses. But our business remains low-cost rented housing on Merseyside. We have a very strong local identity and that is where we intend to stay."
Source
Housing Today
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