21 September 2021
Dear Resident … Delivering the building safety message
Ashleigh Fullwood
Chair, Scrutiny Involvement for Tenants panel,
Newcastle City Council
What persuades any of us to get involved with helping to run our homes and communities?
Social housing tenants, homeowners, people living in the private rented sector: what does it take to get any of us to put our ideas and constructive suggestions forward – and not just our complaints – to the organisations and landlords who have to get the job done?
I first put my own hand up 4 years ago. I heard of plans to create a set up a panel of council tenants who would have the job of scrutinising how my landlord, Your Homes Newcastle, ran the city council’s stock and housing service, and thought – yes, why shouldn’t I have a go at that?
I’ve been involved with SIFT, Newcastle’s Scrutiny Involvement for Tenants, ever since. We’re a small group of volunteer tenants and leaseholders who work to help Newcastle City Council understand how they can improve services for all of us.
They gave us the training we needed to understand the legal obligations of our council and our housing managers, and support to help us set up a website and produce our independent reports. They look at our recommendations – and nearly always accept and act on them – and then we work with them to monitor and review the agreed action plans that come out of that process.
Anyone living in Newcastle City council housing can become a SIFT member. The reality is that though we represent more than 26,000 households, and despite the fact that all of us often encourage friends and neighbours to get involved too, we have a small core of around 10 active members.
Detailed building safety messages were recalled best from the letters that were put through residents’ door.
So when a pilot programme was launched by the MHCLG Best Practice Group after the Grenfell Tower tragedy, the SIFT group were keen to help. Like them, we also wanted answers to the endlessly repeated question – what is the best way to get people involved?
The answer was surprising, perhaps. Given the job of exploring which form of communication reached the most people with the building safety messages they needed to know, we helped design a set of highly visual infographics. We used these to create emails and letters about building safety and designed large posters that were put on display in YHN buildings.
Our surveys told us that the posters were most visible – most people remembered seeing them. But the detailed messages contained in the infographics were recalled best from the letters that had been put through residents’ doors.
When it comes to it, it seems that the older, ‘slower’ ways of communicating still work best. I’d like to see the infographics rolled out to all high-rise blocks in England. For most people, visual graphics are so much easier to look at and understand than written instructions or a diagram.
This work with the MHCLG and the BPG was very enlightening for me. Every effort was made to ensure we had all we needed to complete the work given us, and I was able to expand my knowledge on fire safety. I’ve since been able to share what I’ve learned with other residents and work more closely with YHN staff to keep our buildings safe. None of us want to see another tragedy like Grenfell, and I’m proud to have contributed something to that.
Ashleigh Fullwood is the Chair on the Scrutiny Involvement for Tenants panel at Newcastle City Council.