Changing duties ...

The Council has now agreed to put parks, bins, property maintenance and trading standards into one, Environment Department, and that means a welcome change in my job description. With one department looking after the city, we can expect much greater efficiency and lower costs.

So from the end of the month I will simply be Convener of Housing, and Cllr Bob Duncan will be Convener of Environment. There's plenty to do in Housing, so I won't be twiddling my thumbs. But I'll miss the other departments which have been doing some great work. In the last few days we've announced a graffiti blitz to build on what we've already done all over the city. The vandals keep defacing our buildings, but we're not far behind them and we keep cleaning off their "tags".

We've opened the Riverside Nature Park, which is a brand new park for the city created out of the old Riverside Coup. It's a place to go and see wildlife and take in some spectacular views.

Today along with Shona Robison and Joe Fitzpatrick we launched Child Safety Week, urging people to "Take a Second Look" at their home to ensure unnecessary hazards are removed. And on Friday it's the Solar Cities Conference, which is all about keeping the planet cool and fighting fuel poverty.

I'll also miss the excellent officers in Environmental Services, Waste Management and Dundee Contract Services who have signed up to the doctrine of 'continuous improvement', and as a result are continuously improving the efficiency of their sections.

So I wish Cllr Duncan the best of luck in his new role and I'll concentrate on Housing. I'm confident the officers there will have good news to announce before very long.

Let's talk

Would you ask your neighbour to turn the music down? Late night, someone you don't  know very well, maybe some alcohol involved ... but you can't sleep for the racket and you're getting increasingly angry ...
What happens next? You go up and bang the door and get a mouthful of abuse and no result. You call the police and suddenly your neighbour is your worst enemy. Sometimes a polite request actually works and the neighbour turns down the noise. But however you do it, it's a potential confrontation and these things can get out of hand.
By the time the Council's anti social team gets involved, things have already gone just a wee bit too far. Threats of eviction or ASBOs may stop the noise, but resentment simmers. Instead of a community of neighbours who help each other, your close or your back lane becomes hostile territory. You may fear assault or a verbal tongue lashing. It spoils your life.
So the team is going to try a new tactic. Mediation is not new, but many people involved in noisy neighbour disputes do not understand what it is and do not imagine it could ever work. I think people also fear having to climb down from the entrenched positions they have adopted ... just like politicians. And there's the basic fear factor of confronting someone who may be violent or abusive. As things stand, if people won't go for mediation, the anti social behaviour team won't spend too much time trying to persuade them.
But for a pilot period, the ASB team will spend time with the people on both sides of a noise complaint, explain mediation to them and make it clear that they must at least try this sensible way of resolving a dispute before expecting the council to start swinging legal sledgehammers.
The service is free and the mediators are very skilled at finding common ground, then bringing people together to discuss the problem in a civilised way.
Will it work? I'm sure it will, in many cases, but not in every case. For example, where there is a real threat of violence the most sensible thing to do is bring in the police. But if we can get people talking, we're far more likely to solve problems successfully - and permanently - and probably save ourselves, the police and the courts endless hours of time on disputes which neighbours could resolve themselves, under the guidance of experienced mediators.

What Housing Benefit cuts mean for Dundee

The Westminster Government has announced some big cuts in Housing Benefit, but the detail is complex and I don't think people realise what's about to hit them. So I've tried to show what the cuts actually mean for people in Dundee.

Council and housing association tenants

If you live in a house with an extra bedroom, your benefit will be cut as from April 2013. If you are over pension age, this doesn't apply. Disabled people will be allowed an extra bedroom for a carer, or equipment storage.

Private Tenants

Private tenants will take some of the biggest hits. The cuts mean you'll only get Housing Benefit (or Local Housing Allowance) for the cheapest rents. Until April the going weekly rate in Dundee of Housing Benefit for a three bedroomed flat is £150. After April this changes to £126. The change starts right away for new tenants, and existing tenants get nine months grace before their benefit is cut by £24 a week. How much you lose depends on how big your flat is.

People aged 25 - 35 who have their own private tenancies are in for a shock as from April 2012. They will only be paid enough Housing Benefit to cover the cost of a room in a shared flat. So someone claiming £80.77 now will be cut down to £54.23 a week. That's a benefit cut of more than £100 a month.

Changes that affect everyone

If you have adult relatives living in your house, they are expected to pay towards the rent. This means you get less Housing Benefit. Let's say you have a son who is over 18 and working 40 hours on the minimum wage. He's supposed to contribute £38.20 towards the rent as things stand. From April, he'll have to find another £10.25 a week.

If you're on Jobseekers Allowance, as from 2013 you'll lose 10% of your Housing benefit after twelve months. In Dundee, on average, that's £7.11 per week.

What does it all mean?
If you're on benefit it will be harder to find a private let you can afford. If you do, it is likely to be of poorer quality because landlords who charge lower rents have less money to invest. You may end up on the Council waiting list.

If you are under 35 and single, you won't get a private flat of your own. You can go for a council flat, but the waiting lists are long now. They'll be longer when the cuts come in.

If you're on your own in a two bedroom flat, you won't get the full rent paid and you'll have to dip into your Income Support or move house.

Some people will be unable to take the hit and will lose their homes ... and they'll end up in expensive Council temporary accommodation. Until the Tories and Lib Dems get round to cutting the benefit for that, of course.

Now is the time to lobby your MP about these cuts and try and get them stopped. Why should the poorest pay for the bankers' mistakes? This would not be happening in an independent Scotland ...

(Information from the Scottish Government report - Housing Benefit Changes: Scottish Impact Assessment - and from Dundee City council's HB telephone information line)

Empty houses?

There's been some press speculation about empty houses in Dundee. Cllr MacPherson suggests there are around 4000 and half of them are council or housing association houses.

Not so. 1,165 of these houses are zoned for demolition. These include six multis in Hilltown and parts of Whitfield and Mill o Mains. They also include, strangely, 179 houses used as temporary accommodation for homeless people and another 1,750 privately owned homes which are either lying empty or used as second homes.

All landlords have empty houses which are waiting repairs and relet. At the end of January the Council had 441. Compared to a housing stock of 13,500 houses that's not so bad. However, it's still not good enough and we are putting in a big shift to bring those numbers down. Housing associations have a modest 141.

There are another 384 empties for various reasons; I believe they are mostly in the private sector. Some are empty because the previous occupant has died, gone to jail or gone into full time residential care and the homes may be on sale. Some are mortgage repossessions, and some are under reconstruction.

So in Dundee the main problem with empty homes is in the private sector. We want to see these homes brought back into use. We support the Scottish Government's empty homes initiative. The credit crunch and long waiting lists for rented housing mean we can't afford empty homes in our city.

Very happy to make these figures available to Cllr MacPherson on request ...

Night shelter

Following the post below about homelessness, last night I visited a temporary night shelter being run by volunteers and a church organisation for rough sleepers in the city. The numbers they are dealing with confirm that very few people sleep rough in Dundee; but at the same time a small number of people do sleep rough, for a whole variety of reasons. I hope the project will show whether there are other things the Council should be doing to help this very small number of rough sleepers find their way to the various hostels and other accommodation which exists in the city. When the project reports back, I'll write more on this subject.

Homelessness

A bit of a discussion has been going on in the Evening Tele. Someone called "Housing Observer" was wondering why the Council is demolishing houses when there are so many homeless people in Dundee. I wrote back with the figures.

The Council has around 900 households with homeless priority on its waiting list at any one time. In December of 2010 we had around 170 households in council provided temporary accommodation.

Some houses we have to demolish because they are in such poor condition. But since taking over the Council the SNP has decided to retain six multi storey blocks which would have been demolished under previous plans. We are now investing in them to improve security and, we hope, make them easier to heat.

At the foot of the Hilltown the Dallfield multis are being transformed. Good news is coming shortly about the much trailed recladding scheme, with a combined heat and power scheme to make them energy efficient and far more comfortable. Already there are very few vacancies in these multis, which used to be amongst the most sought after council houses in the city. They will be again!

Sadly it was too late to save the Derby Street multis. People have mixed feelings about their demolition. Some see it as a waste of 374 potentially attractive homes. Others are eagerly looking forward to more light, better views and new, more attractive houses being built in the area.

The credit crunch and Housing Benefit cuts will drive more and more people to the Council's door looking for decent huosing which they can afford. Our job is to provide that housing, keep standards up and balance the budget. There are some difficult times ahead, but we're making real progress.

2011 rent increase

At last night's meeting of the Housing Committee I was forced to rule a motion by Cllr Fraser MacPherson out of order. I have no wish to stifle democratic debate, but Cllr MacPherson made a procedural mistake which left me with little choice.

The rent setting process has two stages ... firstly the Policy and Resources committee sets the budget, then the Housing Committee sets the rent. By law the rent increase must be enough to cover the budget - we are not allowed to subsidise council house rents.

This means that anyone who wants to propose a lower rent increase must first put a motion to the Policy & Resources Committee, cutting something out of the budget.

Cllr MacPherson prepared such a motion, but for reasons unknown failed to put that motion to P&R. As I understand it he had wanted to cut £500,000 off the budgets for preparing relets.

This meant that his proposal to reduce the rent increase would have led to what I would regard as an illegal budget. We would have been half a million short.

In these circumstances I had no option but to rule his motion as incompetent.

It was a long night with a three and a half hour discussion of the biomass plant coming before the housing budget, and it is unfortunate that Cllr MacPherson made this mistake.

In case anyone should imagine that my ruling was an attempt to stifle debate, the rent increase was the subject of a two month consultation; we sent every tenant information about the increase and invited views; and we held open events where tenants could put questions directly to officials.

We also set out the three options at a previous Housing Committee and debated a similar motion from Cllr MacPherson at that time. And last night we chose the lowest of the three options.

No-one wants to put rents up, but we have a legal obligation, imposed by the Scottish Government with all party support, to bring our council houses up to the very basic Scottish Housing Quality Standard. We need to spend around £30 million in this year alone to do that, most of it borrowed. We need to raise rents to cover the cost of that borrowing.

On the other hand, the work we are doing in thousands of homes involves installing new efficient gas central heating systems. They are cheaper to run than most electric systems and tenants will save money as a result.