A cost-cutting model championed by the Northern Housing Consortium is to form the centrepiece of the ODPM's submission to the Gershon review of Whitehall efficiency.
The ODPM calls the model "system thinking". It caught civil servants' eyes when consortium member Home Group used it and reported a drop in the time taken to complete housing repairs from 38 days to just eight.

"System thinking" is the brainchild of consultant John Seddon (HT 17 October 2003, page 18). It evaluates how a process works from the point of view of the user.

The results have shown that targets set by central government are frequently not tough enough or prevent workers from concentrating on improving the service.

An ODPM source said: "The efficiency gains we hope to get from this will be presented to the Gershon team.

"The Home Group case shows the scope for this is very wide.

"We think it works and probably is a good idea but want to check it is transferable to different services and also that it can be made accessible to frontline housing managers."

The ODPM has given an undisclosed sum to the Northern Housing Consortium to run three system thinking pilots at Preston council, Tees Valley Housing Association and arm's-length manager Leeds South East Homes.

The 12-month studies will examine rent collection and arrears, responsive repairs and allocations process or voids.

A committee will evaluate the pilots for the ODPM. Its members include Roy Irwin, chief housing inspector at the Audit Commission; Ian Wright, service development director at the Northern Housing Consortium; and Dave Proctor, chief executive of transfer landlord Pennine 2000 and an ODPM representative.

The group expects to be able to present some broad outlines of potential savings to be included in the Gershon review by July.

The ODPM will submit two other pieces of work to the Gershon review:

  • The recently launched Procurement for Housing Service, a joint venture between the Chartered Institute of Housing, performance inprovement body HouseMark and the National Housing Federation (HT 2 April, page 10) – this is being evaluated by Anne Kirkham, the ODPM's head of decent homes

  • Work concerned with social housing construction and repairs, which is being overseen by Peter Ruback, the ODPM's head of affordable housing.

    • Source

    Housing Today