*O&S
54
At the invitation of the Committee, Mr Paul
Crawford (Chief Executive of Livewest)
was in attendance to provide a presentation that focused on:
-
A brief history of the organisation;
-
Development activity within the organisation;
and
-
The Customer Services ethos of the
organisation.
Furthermore, Members had been invited
to submit their questions in advance to Mr Crawford and 5 had been
received and these were also responded to as part of the
presentation.
During the ensuing discussion, reference was
also made to:-
(a)
copies of the presentation being delivered by Mr
Crawford. A number of Members thanked
Mr Crawford for delivering such an informative presentation and it
was agreed that it would be circulated to all Members after this
Committee meeting;
(b)
the supply and demand for rental housing. Mr Crawford advised that demand outstripped supply
for rental housing by four / five-fold in the South West
region;
(c)
contacting Livewest. In response
to some specific questions, Mr Crawford highlighted the contact
details at the end of his presentation and encouraged Members to
contact their respective local housing officers. In the event that Members did not receive
responses from their local housing officers, then Mr Crawford asked
that issues be then escalated to senior officers;
(d)
the draft Housing Strategy. With regard to challenges in relation to
affordable housing stock and key worker housing, Mr Crawford
highlighted the importance of the Council’s draft Housing
Strategy that was currently subject to a public consultation
exercise;
(e)
high insulation standards. When questioned, Mr Crawford assured the Committee
that Livewest was committed to both
high insulation standards and the de-carbonisation
agenda. Furthermore, the Committee
noted that increased national lobbying was required to ensure that
there were greater affordable energy solutions
available;
(f)
customer satisfaction. Mr Crawford
confirmed that customer satisfaction was captured in a number of
ways and informal resident feedback was obtained on a rolling
monthly basis;
(g)
incidents of Anti-Social Behaviour. The Committee was advised that incidents of
Anti-Social Behaviour were particularly labour intensive for
Livewest officers to
investigate. In addition, the
organisation had seen an upward trend in instances of Anti-Social
Behaviour since the start of the COVID-19 Pandemic.
In conclusion and, on behalf of the
Committee, the Chairman proceeded to thank Mr Crawford for both his
excellent presentation and detailed responses to Member
questions.