London Borough of Waltham Forest (00BH) - Regulatory Judgement: 30 April 2025
Published 30 April 2025
Applies to England
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Our Judgement
| Grade/Judgement | Change | Date of assessment | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Consumer | C2 Our judgement is that there are some weaknesses in the landlord delivering the outcomes of the consumer standards and improvement is needed. |
First grading | April 2025 |
Reason for publication
We are publishing a regulatory judgement for London Borough of Waltham Forest (LB Waltham Forest) following an inspection completed in April 2025. The regulatory judgement confirms a consumer grading of C2. This is the first time we have issued a consumer grade in relation to this landlord.
Summary of the decision
From the evidence and assurance gained during the inspection, our judgement is that there are some weaknesses in LB Waltham Forest delivering the outcomes of the consumer standards and improvement is needed, specifically in relation to the Safety and Quality Standard, the Transparency, Influence and Accountability Standard and the Tenancy Standard. Based on this assessment, we have concluded a C2 grade for LB Waltham Forest.
How we reached our judgement
We carried out an inspection of LB Waltham Forest to assess how well it is delivering the outcomes of the consumer standards, as part of our planned regulatory inspection programme. During the inspection, we considered all four consumer standards: Neighbourhood and Community Standard, Safety and Quality Standard, Tenancy Standard and the Transparency, Influence and Accountability Standard.
During the inspection we observed LB Waltham Forest’s housing scrutiny committee meeting, a Resident Influence and Accountability Panel meeting, and a portfolio lead meeting. We met with involved tenants, officers and councillors, including the leader of LB Waltham Forest, and the portfolio lead for housing. We also reviewed a wide range of documents provided by LB Waltham Forest.
Our regulatory judgement is based on all the relevant information we obtained during the inspection, as well as analysis of information received from LB Waltham Forest through regulatory returns and other regulatory engagement activity.
Summary of findings
Consumer – C2 – April 2025
The Safety and Quality Standard requires landlords to have an accurate, up to date and evidenced understanding of the condition of their homes at an individual property level based on a physical assessment of all homes and ensure that homes meet the requirements of the Decent Homes Standard. During the inspection, LB Waltham Forest provided evidence that it has an accurate record of the condition of its homes, primarily through physical surveys, and a process to keep this information up to date. LB Waltham Forest has a number of homes that are failing to meet the Decent Homes Standard and we saw evidence of the plans in place to ensure all its homes meet the standard and the progress it has made so far. We will continue to monitor and gain assurance that it is delivering these plans and ensuring the safety of tenants until homes are made decent.
We have assurance that LB Waltham Forest has appropriate systems in place to manage its health and safety responsibilities and to ensure the health and safety of tenants in their homes and communal areas. Broadly, the outcomes across health and safety compliance areas are good. We saw evidence of performance reporting to senior officers, councillors and tenants, but we also identified areas where improvements are required to enable effective oversight and scrutiny. We saw evidence that LB Waltham Forest is managing risks associated with damp and mould, albeit under a newly implemented policy and revised process. LB Waltham Forest is undertaking work to complete outstanding remedial actions arising from fire risk assessments and completing outstanding tests on its fixed electrical testing programme. We will continue to engage with LB Waltham Forest to monitor its progress to complete the outstanding tests and actions and embed the newly implemented damp and mould processes.
Our inspection and engagement with LB Waltham Forest and its tenants identified that there are weaknesses in the provision of an effective, efficient and timely repairs and maintenance service. LB Waltham Forest had identified the need to make improvements in this area prior to our inspection, and we saw evidence of the actions LB Waltham Forest had taken, including working with its tenants and contractors to drive improvements. We will continue to engage with LB Waltham Forest and will seek assurance that progress continues to be made so that outcomes for tenants are improved.
The Neighbourhood and Community Standard requires landlords to work in partnership with relevant organisations to promote positive outcomes for tenants. LB Waltham Forest demonstrated that it works effectively with partner agencies, including the police and other partners, on a range of interventions to deter and tackle anti-social behaviour and hate incidents in the neighbourhoods where it provides its homes. We saw evidence that LB Waltham Forest responds to reports of anti-social behaviour, in accordance with its policy and has acted upon the recommendations from an external review of this service to improve outcomes for tenants. However, LB Waltham Forest’s reporting of anti-social behaviour incidents did not distinguish hate incidents. LB Waltham Forest has confirmed it has since revised its approach to the classification of hate incidents and that there will be an increased focus in this area.
With regard to the Tenancy Standard, we saw evidence that LB Waltham Forest offers tenancies or terms of occupation that are compatible with the purpose of its accommodation, the needs of individual households, the sustainability of the community and the efficient use of its housing stock. LB Waltham Forest has a programme of tenancy audits to support tenants, although LB Waltham Forest acknowledged that these are not progressing at the pace expected. We found weaknesses in that LB Waltham Forest does not currently have clear policies that outline its approach to tenancy management. LB Waltham Forest plans to review its tenancy policy and we will work with the landlord as it addresses this issue.
The Transparency, Influence and Accountability Standard requires landlords to provide accessible information so tenants can use landlord services, understand what to expect from their landlord and hold their landlord to account. It also requires landlords to take tenants’ views into account when making decisions about the delivery of landlord services. We gained assurance that LB Waltham Forest provides opportunities for tenants to influence and scrutinise services and saw evidence that tenant feedback had directly and positively impacted on service delivery. We noted that LB Waltham Forest could do more to broaden the range of tenants it engages with. It has also recognised that it needs to improve how it engages with hard-to-reach groups and communicate outcomes of tenants’ views upon strategies, policies and services. It should also ensure that comprehensive landlord performance information is shared in a timely way across a range of methods. We will continue to work with LB Waltham Forest as its looks to improve outcomes in this area.
During the inspection, we gained assurance that LB Waltham Forest is committed to treating tenants and prospective tenants with fairness and respect. We saw evidence that LB Waltham Forest has some understanding of the diverse needs of its tenants, but it needs to undertake more work to improve the information it holds about its tenants so it is able to tailor services to tenants’ individual needs and ensure the delivery of fair and equitable outcomes. LB Waltham Forest has identified this as an area of weakness and has plans to improve the amount and quality of information it holds and how it uses this information.
LB Waltham Forest has recently made changes to its complaints handling service following feedback from its tenants, response time performance and Housing Ombudsman Service determinations. While we have seen some evidence of improvements, as the changes are recent we have not seen sustained improvements and so we will continue to engage with LB Waltham Forest to gain assurance that changes leading to improved outcomes for tenants continue to be embedded.
LB Waltham Forest demonstrated through the inspection that it understands where it needs to make improvements, and we have assurance that it is addressing the areas of weakness identified.
Background to the judgement
About the landlord
LB Waltham Forest is an outer-London borough council, it owns 9,751 homes for rent and 198 shared ownership homes. It has two tenant management organisations that manage around 10% of its homes.
Our role and regulatory approach
We regulate for a viable, efficient, and well governed social housing sector able to deliver quality homes and services for current and future tenants.
We regulate at the landlord level to drive improvement in how landlords operate. By landlord we mean a registered provider of social housing. These can either be local authorities, or private registered providers (other organisations registered with us such as non-profit housing associations, co-operatives, or profit-making organisations).
We set standards which state outcomes that landlords must deliver. The outcomes of our standards include both the required outcomes and specific expectations we set. Where we find there are significant failures in landlords which we consider to be material to the landlord’s delivery of those outcomes, we hold them to account. Ultimately this provides protection for tenants’ homes and services and achieves better outcomes for current and future tenants. It also contributes to a sustainable sector which can attract strong investment.
We have a different role for regulating local authorities than for other landlords. This is because we have a narrower role for local authorities and the Governance and Financial Viability Standard, and Value for Money Standard do not apply. Further detail on which standards apply to different landlords can be found on our standards page.
We assess the performance of landlords through inspections and by reviewing data that landlords are required to submit to us. In Depth Assessments (IDAs) were one of our previous assessment processes, which are now replaced by our new inspections programme from 1 April 2024. We also respond where there is an issue or a potential issue that may be material to a landlord’s delivery of the outcomes of our standards. We publish regulatory judgements that describe our view of landlords’ performance with our standards. We also publish grades for landlords with more than 1,000 social housing homes.
The Housing Ombudsman deals with individual complaints. When individual complaints are referred to us, we investigate if we consider that the issue may be material to a landlord’s delivery of the outcomes of our standards.
For more information about our approach to regulation, please see Regulating the standards.