The Scottish Housing Regulator today announced a programme of visits to nine social landlords to discuss their Annual Assurance Statement.
Each year by 31 October every social landlord must prepare and publish an Annual Assurance Statement which confirms whether it meets the regulatory requirements for all social landlords and the Standards of Governance and Financial Management for Registered Social Landlords (RSLs).
The Regulator will visit these nine landlords to understand their approach to preparing their Statement and how they have assured themselves about compliance with regulatory requirements and Standards. To ensure an appropriate mixture, the selected landlords are of different sizes, structures, levels of complexity and geographical location.
The visits will have a particular focus on how the landlords have assured themselves about compliance with their tenant and resident safety duties. For RSLs, the visits will also focus on their approach to monitoring and reporting on compliance with their financial covenants.
Helen Shaw, Director of Regulation said:
“This is our fifth programme of visits to landlords about the Statements. The visits give us assurance about the work landlords undertake to prepare their Statement. During the visits we also find out what has worked well for landlords by engaging directly with staff, RSL governing body members and Local Authority Committee members. We will publish a report later this year on the findings to share lessons learned with all social landlords as they look to prepare their next Statements.”
Notes to editors
- The Scottish Housing Regulator was established on 1 April 2011 under the Housing (Scotland) Act 2010. Its objective is to safeguard and promote the interests of tenants and others who use local authority and RSL housing services. The Regulator operates independently of Scottish Ministers and is accountable directly to the Scottish Parliament. It assumed its full regulatory responsibilities on 1 April 2012. The Regulator consists of the Chair and eight Board members. More information about the Regulator can be found on its website at housingregulator.gov.scot.
- SHR’s current approach to how it regulates social landlords is set out in its current regulatory framework – Regulation of Social Housing in Scotland.