Welcome to Canary Quay!
We were delighted to bring together the first tenants at Patricia Hollis House at a ‘meet the neighbours’ event in December.
Patricia Hollis House is Phase 1 of our ambitious new Canary Quay development. It consists of 60 one- and two-bedroom apartments for social rent. The first tenants moved in during October 2019.
Eventually Canary Quay will create 323 new homes – a mix of social and intermediate rent and open market properties. The new homes are being built by RG Carter; the architects are Ingleton Wood and the consulting engineers Rossi Long.
The official opening of Patricia Hollis House will be in July 2020* (postponed from April due to the Coronavirus outbreak).
*this may be postponed due to Coronavirus.
One of the first tenants to receive their keys at Canary Quay was Andrew Parfitt, whose new home overlooks two of his former workplaces.
Retired railwayman Andrew worked at the rail depot right next to the new development. Before that he worked at the Colman’s works, just across the river, which he can now see from the balcony of his 6th-floor one-bedroom apartment.
Andrew has lived in Norwich since his early 20s. Previously he was living in rented accommodation which was plagued by anti-social behaviour. He is delighted with his new home.
“When I first saw the flat I was amazed – it’s so nice. My dad was a builder, so I can appreciate the quality of the finish. It’s done to a great standard. The moment I walked in, I was sold!
“It’s so nice to be coming back to where I spent most of my working life, it’s a part of the city I love. This is now my ‘forever home’. I’m confident is it going to be a real community.”
Canary Quay tenant, Andrew Parfitt
20 year-old Brandon Cheesman is another new tenant. He spent the previous 18 months in shared accommodation at the YMCA. His one-bedroom 5th-floor apartment at Canary Quay is his first home (pictured).
Brandon grew up in Norwich and has been working in tree surgery with his granddad. He is hoping to take his certificates and become a tree surgeon himself.
“It has got everything. Being in the city I can walk everywhere, or get the bus easily. Everything like shops are close by. And I really love the football, which is next door.
“My flat is really good quality. When my mum saw it, she was so excited she joked that she wanted to move out of her own house and live here!”
Housing with care rated ‘outstanding’
Two of our housing with care schemes have been rated ‘outstanding’ by the CQC (Care Quality Commission). Nationally, just 3% of care is rated outstanding by the CQC.
The Lawns in Great Yarmouth and Lisbon Court in King’s Lynn, where our partner NorseCare provides care and support services, were both inspected by the CQC in 2019. The inspectors spoke to tenants, their relatives and staff at The Lawns and reported that:
“…the service was exceptional in placing people at the heart of the service with a strong person-centred caring and responsive ethos.”
Broadland tenants told the inspectors that they were “treated with exceptional kindness, compassion and respect.” One tenant described the staff as “absolutely wonderful, always there when I need them and always cheerful”.
The CQC report on Lisbon Court remarked how staff:
“…went above and beyond what was expected of them to help ensure people were not isolated and continued to be engaged in the service and wider community and take part in meaningful activity.”
Together with Tenants
A new requirement in the National Housing Federation Code of Governance is for housing association boards to be accountable to their tenants. It involves a new Together with Tenants Charter, tenant oversight and reporting of progress against the charter, and giving tenants a stronger collective voice with the regulator.
Carole Burchett, chair of the Soha Housing Scrutiny Panel
We held our first Tenant Involvement seminar in October. Carole Burchett, chair of the Soha Housing Scrutiny Panel, talked about why she had first got involved as a tenant, and what a big difference it has made to her own life and that of her community. Our Housing Director, Catherine Little, updated tenants about the national See The Person campaign, which is challenging the stigma around social housing. Finally, Siobhan Trice, one of our tenant board members, did a short Q&A about her role on the board.
In March 2020 a focus group of Broadland tenants shared their ideas and opinions for a new ‘See The Person’ toolkit, focusing on how housing associations and their staff perpetuate stigma, and some positive changes they could make. “Assume that you don’t work and will be there for appointments”, “More training for staff and contractors” and “See the person as a name, not a number” were among the comments that tenants raised.
The benefits of Community Conversations
Since we launched our Community Conversations programme in summer 2018 we have visited 17 locations, talked to 148 tenants and implemented changes to both our services and our policies as a result.
These changes range from communicating more clearly to tenants about making alterations to Broadland property and publishing schedules for planned maintenance works, to implementing improvements at individual schemes, including raising awareness about flytipping and grounds and garden issues.
At each Community Conversation, our Chief Executive Michael Newey and members of the senior management team meet small groups of tenants in local venues around Norfolk in the early evening.
At each session we ask tenants:
- What does Broadland do well?
- What could Broadland do better?
Although the programme has been temporarily paused, due to Coronavirus restrictions, we are looking forward to resuming them as soon as it is safe for our tenants and staff to do so.
We are very grateful to all the tenants who have given up their evening to join a Community Conversation. Their feedback is making a real difference and it is certainly changing the way we look at our services.