A major housing association has been downgraded by the Regulator of Social Housing (RSH) in its latest tranche of regulatory judgements.

Notting Hill Genesis (NHG) has had its governance rating downgraded to G3, after an inspection found serious regulatory concerns, with significant improvements needed to business planning and its control framework.

According to the RSH, NHG’s risk management, internal controls and assurance framework is not robust enough to enable the board to identify and manage risks.

The regulator says it found limited evidence of NHG’s board providing effective oversight of landlord health and safety compliance. While improvements are in progress, the range of issues that have arisen is challenging.

Although NHG’s V2 viability grading remains unchanged, it must manage significant financial risks carefully to ensure continued compliance in the short term, the RSH says.

The inspection also found that NHG failed to deliver outcomes in the RSH’s new consumer standards, introduced on 1 April 2024, finding:

• A substantial backlog of overdue fire remediation actions

• A lack of data on whether legal requirements had been met in a large number of third party managed buildings

• A significant repairs backlog

• A lack of up-to-date accurate data, with only around half of homes having had a survey in the last five years.

Three other landlords, Southwark Council, Southampton Council and West Northamptonshire Council, have also been given a C3 grading, which means there are serious failings, and they need to make significant improvements.

Following an inspection of the Southwark Council, the RSH found:

• A failure to self-refer despite more than half of homes having no smoke alarms. More than half had also not had electrical condition test for over five years

• Almost 2,000 overdue fire safety remedial actions

• The last stock condition survey was undertaken in 2010, based on a sample of 10% of general needs and 20% of street properties

• A failure to allocate homes, especially empty homes, in a fair and transparent way that takes the needs of tenants and prospective tenants into account.

Following an inspection of Southampton City Council, the RSH found:

• Nearly half (47%) of homes do not meet the Decent Homes Standard

• Poor performance for routine repairs, with long void turnaround times and long call waiting times – in part due to underinvestment in planned capital works over a prolonged period

• Weaknesses around asbestos safety

• Little evidence that tenants’ views are taken into account in decision making

• A lack of fairness, effectiveness and timeliness in complaints handling.

West Northamptonshire Council self-referred to the RSH in September 2024 after identifying an issue with data quality and health and safety compliance. The RSH’s responsive engagement found:

• A lack of assurance over safety checks for fire, electrical, water, asbestos, lifts and smoke and carbon monoxide alarms

• Limited evidence that remedial actions were being completed within appropriate timescales.

Kate Dodsworth, Chief of Regulatory Engagement at the RSH, said: “Landlords must have robust systems to identify and manage risk. We assess providers’ governance for those landlords within our economic remit.

“We also expect all landlords to take the health and safety of tenants in their homes extremely seriously. They must listen to tenants’ concerns, acting swiftly to resolve any issues and this cannot be achieved without accurate, up-to-date data.

“We are engaging intensively with the landlords in each of these cases as they work to put things right for tenants. A self-referral is a positive sign that a landlord is taking accountability and understands their responsibilities.”

The London Borough of Lambeth, Medway Council, East Midlands Housing Group Limited, Chesterfield Borough Council and Stevenage Borough Council received C2 gradings following an inspection.

Provider	Consumer	Change	Governance	Change	Viability	Change
Chesterfield Borough Council	C2	First Grading	–	–	–	–
East Midlands Housing Group Limited	C2	First Grading	G1	Assessed & unchanged	V2	Assessed & unchanged
Livin Housing Limited	C2	First Grading	G1	Assessed & unchanged	V2	Assessed & unchanged
London Borough of Lambeth	C2	First Grading	–	–	–	–
Medway Council	C2	First Grading	–	–	–	–
Notting Hill Genesis	C3	First Grading	G3	Downgrade	V2	Assessed & unchanged
Southampton City Council	C3	First Grading	–	–	–	–
Southwark Council	C3	First Grading	–	–	–	–
Stevenage Borough Council	C2	First Grading	–	–	–	–
West Northamptonshire Council	C3	First Grading	–	–	–	–

 

The RSH has also published regulatory judgements for a further 25 landlords from the stability check programme, with all but two retaining their previous governance and viability gradings.

Stability checks are a yearly exercise where we look at the financial information landlords have submitted to us (including their most recent business plan and annual accounts) and consider whether their current viability grade is consistent with this.

Provider	Governance	Change	Viability	Change	Engagement Process
Abri Group Limited	G1	Assessed and unchanged	V1	Assessed and unchanged	Stability Check
Arches Housing Limited	G1	Assessed and unchanged	V1	Assessed and unchanged	Stability Check
Aster Group Limited	G1	Assessed and unchanged	V1	Assessed and unchanged	Stability Check
Bernicia Group	G1	Assessed and unchanged	V1	Assessed and unchanged	Stability Check
Castles & Coasts Housing Association Limited	G1	Assessed and unchanged	V1	Assessed and unchanged	Stability Check
Chelmer Housing Partnership Limited	G1	Assessed and unchanged	V2	Assessed and unchanged	Stability Check
Croydon Churches Housing Association Limited	G1	Assessed and unchanged	V1	Assessed and unchanged	Stability Check
Curo Group (Albion) Limited	G1	Assessed and unchanged	V2	Assessed and unchanged	Stability Check
Eden Housing Association Limited	G1	Assessed and unchanged	V2	Assessed and unchanged	Stability Check
English Rural Housing Association Limited	G1	Assessed and unchanged	V2	Assessed and unchanged	Stability Check
Grand Union Housing Group Limited	G1	Assessed and unchanged	V2	Viability regrade V1 to V2	Stability Check and Responsive Engagement
Housing Solutions	G1	Assessed and unchanged	V1	Assessed and unchanged	Stability Check
Irwell Valley Housing Association Limited	G1	Assessed and unchanged	V2	Assessed and unchanged	Stability Check
Local Space	G1	Assessed and unchanged	V1	Assessed and unchanged	Stability Check
Manningham Housing Association Limited	G1	Assessed and unchanged	V1	Assessed and unchanged	Stability Check
Ocean Housing Group Limited	G1	Assessed and unchanged	V2	Assessed and unchanged	Stability Check
Onward Group Limited	G1	Assessed and unchanged	V2	Assessed and unchanged	Stability Check
Orbit Group Limited	G1	Assessed and unchanged	V2	Assessed and unchanged	Stability Check
Orwell Housing Association Limited	G1	Assessed and unchanged	V2	Assessed and unchanged	Stability Check
South Lakes Housing	G1	Assessed and unchanged	V2	Assessed and unchanged	Stability Check
Thrive Homes Limited	G1	Assessed and unchanged	V2	Assessed and unchanged	Stability Check
Wakefield And District Housing Limited	G1	Assessed and unchanged	V1	Assessed and unchanged	Stability Check
Wrekin Housing Group Limited (The)	G1	Assessed and unchanged	V2	Assessed and unchanged	Stability Check
Yorkshire Housing Limited	G1	Assessed and unchanged	V2	Assessed and unchanged	Stability Check
Your Housing Group Limited	G1	Upgrade	V2	Assessed and unchanged	Stability Check and Responsive Engagement