Compliance with Housing Regulator's Update

The Regulator of Social Housing (RSH) sets the standards which social landlords, including local authorities, must deliver to ensure tenants experience high quality homes and services.

2024 inspection and judgement

The RSH issued a Regulatory Judgement for Melton Borough Council in August 2024, following one of the first planned inspections in the country against the new Consumer Standards, which took effect on 1st April 2024, through which it has recognised strong performance, good progress and plans for further improvement.

During the inspection, the regulator considered all four of its consumer standards: Neighbourhood and Community Standard, Safety and Quality Standard, Tenancy Standard, and the Transparency, Influence and Accountability Standard. The regulator gathered information through reviewing a wide range of documents and data, and by observing meetings, including the first meeting of the Landlord Assurance Board, a meeting of the Council’s scrutiny committee with a tenant workshop, and a meeting with tenant representatives. The inspection team also met with engaged tenants, council officers, councillors and key stakeholders including those who work closely with the council, including police, fire and county council colleagues.

In its judgement, the regulator recognised that the council:

• Is meeting its health and safety obligations, and outcomes across all key areas of compliance are good.
• Has an accurate record of the condition of tenants' homes and that a high percentage of homes meet the Decent Homes Standard, with costed investment plans in place.
• Has a focus on tenant experience and that this is supported by a range of processes, with good interactions observed between staff and tenants.
• Demonstrates a commitment to treating tenants with fairness and respect.  
• Demonstrates a commitment to build on existing arrangements to support tenants in influencing and scrutinising policies and services.
• Publicises its approach to complaints and that this is accessible.
• Works in partnership with relevant organisations to deter and tackle anti-social behaviour.
• Uses its housing stock effectively and supports tenants to sustain their tenancies.

Areas requiring further development and improvement within the Transparency, Influence and Accountability Standard are set out in the regulatory judgement. This also confirms that the council understands where it needs to make improvements, and that the regulator was assured that the council already had plans in progress to deliver them.

Specifically, the areas identified, and which the council is focussed on improving further are:

• Developing a more reciprocal approach to tenant engagement, so as to ‘turn up the volume’ on tenant voice.
• To improve the collection, quality and use of tenant information to strengthen the Council's ability to proactively tailor services to tenants’ needs and to more clearly demonstrate outcomes for tenants.
• To increase the visibility of performance information for tenants.
• To strengthen IT systems to support complaints reporting and monitoring.
• To improve the case management systems used to monitor and report on ASB trends and outcomes for tenants.

 Progress since inspection

Following the original inspection and judgement the Council has continued to engage with the RSH. The purpose of this is to update the RSH on the Council's progress against the areas of improvement, listed above, that were identified in the original inspection. As of December 2025, the Council has been able to demonstrate significant improvement against all of the areas and can now demonstrate broad compliance with four out of five of the items on the original list. The main area that requires further development is the quantity of tenant data held.

A tenant census is planned for early 2026 which will seek to gather key data for all tenants. Holding more data on each tenant will allow services to be tailored to meet their needs.

The Council will continue to engage with the RSH to ensure that they are satisfied with the improvements made and compliance with the consumer standards.

If you are a Melton Borough Council tenant and would like to ask any questions about the inspection or action plan, or how you can get involved as a tenant, please contact Assistant Director for Housing Quality, Development and Landlord Services, Chris Flannery via e-mail: cflannery@melton.gov.uk or call 01664 502502.