So, as a teacher and headteacher, I saw at close quarters how a decent home helps children, families and entire communities realise their potential.
But alongside the day job, I’ve served on councils, on housing association boards and ALMO governance. I’ve long since concluded that the ALMO model gives residents and communities the best of all worlds.
When I became a local councillor in the 1990s, though local authority housing had moved on from its notoriously prescriptive post-war approach, it still retained much of its patronising culture. Any tenant consultation was often in name only; the ethos persisted that the council knew best. On top of that, operational matters often came a poor second to political concerns, whether local or handed down from central government.
Until the Decent Homes grants of the early 2000s, government bureaucracy prevented councils from investing in large-scale improvements and building new stock, and being a social housing tenant usually meant putting up with decaying, badly maintained and sometimes poor quality buildings.
When I left the council and was invited onto the board of a housing association, the freedom from bureaucracy and government meddling was refreshing. We were looking after new homes and well-maintained stock, supported by a strong tenant voice – tenants were even among my fellow board members, a first for me.
However, housing associations needed more money. Rental income alone wasn’t sufficient to both fund good maintenance and meet the demand for more social homes. During my time on the board, grants were slowly but surely cut and commercial borrowing became ever more important.

Look at any economy in any age and you see that subsidised housing is vital for a well-functioning society. 

Lenders obviously needed a return on that investment – and their agenda gradually began to dominate the management of most HA-run social housing. Associations moved from being local community businesses to large national ones; tenant voice was drowned out by the demands of the accountants, and the bottom line mattered more than the service.
At the same time, the country’s stock of social housing began to shrink. Why this was allowed to happen, or why some argued that subsidising housing was immoral and unfair has always mystified me. Look at pretty much any economy in any age, and you see that a well-functioning society will always need subsidised housing. Pit villages were built by mine-owners, Saltaire and Bourneville were built by factory owners. It’s how landowners have provided themselves with a stable workforce since feudal times. Even today, home-ownership is subsidised by the taxpayer through Help to Buy schemes, and has been since Right to Buy was given to council tenants in the 1980s.

ALMO housing management balances flexible and quick decision-making with genuine community oversight.

I have to confess that I was a little disillusioned by the time I was invited in the early 2000s to join the board of one of the first ALMOs, Derby Homes, set up by Derby City Council. But almost immediately I saw the difference.
The same crumbling stock I had dealt with as a local councillor was being transformed by the Decent Homes grants ALMOs were allowed to claim. Oversight of stock management lay with a board made up of equal numbers of councillors, independents and tenants. Our independent members were not just fiscal experts – though we had a few of those. They were also people who knew the community.
When an ALMO works well – usually when it has a good, constructive two-way partnership with its parent council – its governance model creates genuine democratic accountability. I have even heard senior local government officers from councils across England saying how much they wish other areas of council work had a similar structure.
What they admire is the way it balances flexible and quick decision-making with genuine community oversight. At the same time, it keeps narrow, clique-driven party politics and the vagaries of the electoral cycle at arm’s length. The clue is in the arms-length management organisation title, though in Derby, where our relationship with the city council is excellent, these days we prefer to describe this as ‘arms linked’.

ALMOs are free from the distortion of financial and political agendas.

All ALMOs are different but they all function as a full part of their local authority’s offering to its communities and support their councils’ aims and objectives. The taxpayer wins too. ALMOs can build more cheaply because they can borrow more cheaply, and the return on any loan goes straight back into public finances. And it’s a win for tenants who know they have a landlord who puts them first, not a faceless lender.
In summary – ALMOs have the skills and freedom of a private company and yet retain democratic accountability. They are largely free from the distortion of financial and political agendas. Their assets are publicly owned and pass to future generations. They genuinely listen to the tenant voice. Most importantly they deliver efficient services to their tenants, councils and local communities.
I’m so proud to be associated with this movement – and, as you might guess, I feel greatly honoured to have been asked to chair the board of the NFA which fights tirelessly for our way of doing housing.