"Serious" and "long-standing" issues have been identified in the district council's handling of its social housing stock by a government watchdog.

A report from the Regulator of Social Housing found Warwick District Council (WDC) had failed in a number of areas to care for the tenants in its 5,500 social housing properties, over a prolonged period of time.

Having referred itself for a review, the council was found to not be meeting its legal requirements.

The report said the council had not completed a full assessment of all its social housing for eight years, despite landlords being required to "have an accurate, up to date and evidenced understanding of the condition of their homes".

While reviews have restarted, inaccuracies have also been found in new reports.

The council was also revealed to have a backlog of 1,600 "fire remedial actions" for smoke and carbon monoxide alarms.

The local authority was also criticised for how it deals with repairs to social houses.

"We found that Warwick DC does not have adequate systems and processes in place for the delivery and oversight of repairs and it has a low level of confidence in the reported information on repairs performance," the report continued. 

"As a result, we are not assured that Warwick DC is providing an effective, efficient and timely repairs service for tenants."

It added: "Our judgement is that there are serious failings in the landlord delivering the outcomes of the consumer standards and significant improvement is needed."

Speaking to councillors last week, Cllr Helen Adkins admitted there are "deep-rooted" problems and said the report shows the "gravity of the situation became undeniable". 

She reassured members positive steps are being taken to fix the issues.

"From the outset, this Green-Labour administration has been concerned about aspects of the way Warwick District Council's housing assets are managed," the portfolio holder for housing and assets said. 

"Over the last 12 months, we've been working hard to address the huge number of issues left by previous administrations. 

"Risk and complaints procedures have been designed and are being implemented. 

"Officers are working hard on our housing safety action plan and have been praised by the body providing external advice, commenting they have made 'an impressive amount of progress…'. 

"Overall, we are prioritising a major restructure of how the council operates in this area, to be sharper, more effective, with clear lines of responsibility. 

"To this end we, as an administration, are developing a new housing strategy."

While the steps to fix the problems were praised, council leader Cllr Ian Davison said it will take at least two years for all the issues to be rectified.

"It is extremely disappointing that the external reviews of the council services itemise so many long-standing failings; but I am impressed how efficiently officers are now addressing the issues," he commented. 

"Even so, we expect it will take another two years to rebuild the council's housing processes to provide a high-quality service for our council tenants and value-for-money for taxpayers."

(Header image by Robin Stott via geograph.org.uk)