Decision details

The Executive will asked to approve the Council’s response to the Audit Commission Inspection of the Housing Advice Service and its recommendations

Received a report from the Corporate Director of Customer Services following the Audit Commission’s inspection of the Council’s Housing Advice Service.

The inspectors made a number of recommendations to improve the service including:

·  Targeting homeless households for support with bidding for available houses;

·  Ensuring the homelessness strategy is thoroughly reviewed and agreed with all stakeholders and published, with opportunities for scrutiny; and

·  Ensuring that the service is achieving value for money by assessing unit costs and outcomes, and benchmarking these against other services.

Agreed, in order to assist the Council in achieving its Community Priorities of “Improving Health, Housing and Social Care” and “Promoting Equal Opportunities and Celebrating Diversity”, to:

(i)  Note the Audit Commission’s Inspection Report and, in particular, the main recommendations as detailed in the report;

(ii)  Endorse the Improvement Plan produced in response to the inspection findings and recommendations; and

(iii)  Note that a progress report on the implementation of the action plan will be submitted in March 2009.