Did you know who lives in Richmond...
11 March 2024
Currently sat waiting for my train home having just been to visit one of our newest PlaceShapers members...
Richmond Housing Partnership operate across Richmond and other local and similarly wealthy suburbs of London, where some of the country's wealthiest and ‘A’ list celebrities live next door to social housing customers.
Surely this is the mixed tenure model we all aspire to create, and hearing Sarah Thomas talk, RHP's Chief Executive, it is something to be celebrated. However as with most things, it is not without its challenges. The vulnerability of some customers nominated from local authority waiting lists and their occasionally chaotic lives create housing management issues which cannot be resolved in the speedy manner some of their neighbours expect.
Within this context, RHP both manages those challenges and works in partnership with the local authorities where they have homes to try to foster sustainable communities. As part of that aim, they are building 3 and 4 bed homes, which require subsidy to work financially yet they build anyway because the communities need them, no one else is building them, and it’s the right thing to do. They also support charities like the local furniture bank, so that the community continues to receive support beyond the basic provision of a home.
It stuck me in listening to Sarah, and Director of Strategy, Transformation & Culture, Chloe Marsh, that they care. Not just about having a viable business plan and being well run (which it is), or even just about their staff team (their office environment is fab), but they actually care and care deeply about the lives of their customers. Sarah met us in reception and showed us round the office including their coffee shop and café which is open to staff and customers. She said hi to an older chap buying a coffee and later explained he was a customer who came in every morning.
She went on to say he had a number of health issues, including recently starting to develop dementia. His health worker had raised concerns about him not attending appointments, so with his housing officer it was agreed the health visitor would come to RHP one morning and use one of the meeting rooms to conduct the review and assessments needed. It was a simple, person centred solution that worked and actually also said a lot about the culture of the organisation, where staff and customers are encouraged to share the same space – what a great way to break down any barriers.
Sarah later talked about the deliberate approach RHP were taking in shifting the focus from being about processes, to being about people. From what Catherine Ryder and I saw and heard today, it’s working. Welcome to PlaceShapers RHP, you are clearly putting place-making at the heart of your decision-making.
