Mark Prisk, speaking at the National Housing Federation conference in Birmingham yesterday, said the government and HCA will look more closely at providers’ re-letting policies when considering bids under the 2015-18 programme and compare them to similar organisations to ensure providers maximise their own income.
Mr Prisk said: ‘What we have noticed is a huge variance in the achievements, as it were, between different similar associations.
‘Some of them have had a clear target of 50 per cent [of re-lets converted] and have been able to achieve that and others, in a very similar situation in similar locations, are way below.’ He described the number of re-lets converted under the current programme as ‘modest.’
Mr Prisk said the government expects providers to bring forward ‘ambitious plans for maximising their own financial contribution’, including maximising levels of re-lets converted to affordable rent.
He said the government will be ‘more persistent when we see there is an under-performance in terms of re-letting policy.’