Customers at the heart
Community engagement
We have continued to work closely with our communities across the Group, despite the challenges we have faced due to the pandemic. We held our first-ever Progress Community Champion Awards as a way of saying a big thank you to all the many volunteers who have worked so hard to support our local communities throughout such a challenging year. The awards event was held on Zoom and was attended by 80 people.
Due to Covid-19, colleagues were redeployed from 1 April to 30 June to support other critical areas of the Group, including the Incident Support Team, Progress Lifeline, Supported Living Team, Income Collection Team, and the Marketing and Communications Team. Despite this, we have had some fantastic achievements, including being shortlisted for a Northern Housing Award.
We hosted a total of 184 equality, diversity, and inclusion events and activities, with 4,092 attendances and people taking part.
We have successfully managed to host a total of 184 equality, diversity, and inclusion events and activities, with 4,092 attendances and people taking part. These have included Hanukkah, Hate Crime Awareness sessions with Disability Equality North West, and the Double R Arts youth project videos. We also supported the 'See the Person' campaign by hosting an information session attended by 50 people, including tenants, colleagues, and other housing providers and organisations.
Throughout May and June, we hosted our Progress In Bloom competition to promote positive health and wellbeing through the enjoyment of nature and to celebrate the skill and hard work tenants and customers put into making their gardens a thing of beauty.
We also held Christmas and Easter card competitions. We delivered 1,400 individual mince pies and Easter eggs to our independent living tenants, including 300 Easter eggs donated by Consortia.
We delivered 1,400 individual mince pies and Easter eggs to our independent living tenants.
An inclusive tenant voice
As part of the equality, diversity and inclusion work we have established a sub-group looking at community groups and customers. This group aims to understand the make-up of our customers and create firm links with community groups that can help us to understand the needs of minority groups better.
The sub-group is also networking with groups and organisations who have a good reputation for their approach to equality, diversity and inclusion to see what best practice can be introduced across the Group.
We undertake regular reviews of our Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) Strategy and objectives to ensure they remain fit for purpose and assist us in delivering our EDI commitments.
We are a founder supporter of See the Person, a national tenant-led campaign which was established in 2017 to help smash the stereotype publicity around social housing.
We continued to provide services throughout the pandemic.
Community safety
Due to the immense challenges Covid-19 presented, the Community Safety Team needed to adapt quickly to agile and home-working whilst continuing to provide a high-quality service to keep our residents and communities safe. We experienced a much higher level of anti-social behaviour cases during the year, working effectively to resolve over 900 cases - a considerable increase of 50% on the previous year.
We continued to ensure compliance with gas and electrical safety legislation and worked directly with customers to gain access to properties. Where necessary, we used the legal tools available through the courts to secure access injunctions and reassured customers that any essential visits were COVID-secure. We also carried out welfare calls to vulnerable customers throughout the lockdown periods.
We worked to resolve over 900 anti-social behaviour cases - a considerable increase of 50% on the previous year.
We have signed up to the new Respect Anti-social Behaviour Charter for housing. The purpose of the charter is to improve the anti-social behaviour services of housing bodies.
Partnership working
We have effectively adapted our ways of working to best suit our customers' needs during the pandemic. We have continued to facilitate our partnership meetings through predominantly digital formats, enabling us to continue working closely with our partners to reduce crime and anti-social behaviour to safeguard our vulnerable residents during a challenging period.
Our Community Safety Team is working closely with internal partners to provide effective services in partnership with the community housing officers and area managers, whilst being the go-to-experts for any anti-social behaviour or nuisance cases.