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Pembrokeshire Housing Association - 'A Good Service Overall'

22/03/2007

Auditor General's inspection report published today

Pembrokeshire Housing Association is providing good or better services in six out of eight key areas, according to an inspection report by the Auditor General for Wales. The report, published today, found that the Association provided an 'excellent' rents service and had 'good' arrangements in place in the following areas - its relationship with residents; providing housing; housing people with support needs; lettings; and managing properties. The Association was also found to have 'satisfactory' arrangements in place for equal opportunities and maintenance services.

Today's report also identifies several examples of good practice at the Association. These include giving tenants access to a welfare benefits advisor, providing a tenant support service; offering a furnished homes scheme; and a Housing Plus budget -  which allocates funds to eligible schemes to improve estates and individual homes.

The report found that the Association was also raising standards in service delivery. But there are still some areas that need improvement and the report makes a number of recommendations. These include:

• Evaluating outcomes from the Association's Tenant Participation Strategy
• Making sure the Association adheres to its complaints policy
• Clarifying internal arrangements for dealing with people who might be considered high risk
• Developing more specific plans for improving the completion of maintenance and repairs against target times

Jeremy Colman, Auditor General for Wales, said today:
"This is a good report for Pembrokeshire Housing Association, which overall is providing good quality services for its tenants. The Association is also raising its standards of service delivery, but needs to develop a balanced range of performance measures, so that it can clearly see whether it is achieving the service standards it has set."

Notes to Editors:

• The inspection of Pembrokeshire Housing Association took place in June 2005. It operates as a group structure, with one non-charitable subsidiary and one active charitable subsidiary (Pembrokeshire Care and Repair 2000). Neither subsidiary was subject to this inspection.

• The Association was established in 1981 and manages around 1,500 properties from St Davids to Saundersfoot. Its headquarters are based in Haverfordwest.

• The Welsh Assembly Government has appointed the Wales Audit Office to carry out the inspection of housing associations in Wales. Inspection is carried out under the Local Government Act 1998, as amended by the Public Audit (Wales) Act 2004

• The specific questions about each aspect the inspection covers are set out in the latest version of the Assembly Regulatory Code for Housing Associations in Wales. This can be found by clicking on the following link: http://new.wales.gov.uk/topics/housingandcommunity/housing/publications/
regulatorycodehas;jsessionid=9B45EEEB797A798A2F70307FCF99609A.www1?lang=en

• The Wales Audit Office is independent of government and is responsible for the annual audit of some £19 billion of annual public expenditure.

• The Wales Audit Office was created in April 2005 through the Public Audit (Wales) Act, 2004, which expanded the functions of the Auditor General for Wales and enabled the transfer of staffs from the Audit Commission in Wales and National Audit Office in Wales to his employment.

Ends

For more information please contact Rachel Moss on 029 2026 2675 or email rachel.moss@wao.gov.uk

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