Thurrock Council - Housing Services Audit 2005

Inspection report January 2005 Housing Services Thurrock Borough Council p 2 Thurrock Borough Council - Housing Services Contents The Housing Inspectorate 2 Summary 2 Scoring the service 2 Recommendations 2 Report 2 Context 2 The locality 2 The council 2 The service 2 How good is the service? 2 Diversity 2 Access and customer care 2 Value for money 2 Strategy and enabling 2 Homelessness and housing advice 2 Resident involvement 2 Summary 2 What are the prospects for improvement to the service? 2 What is the evidence of service improvement? 2 How good are the current improvement plans? 2 Will improvements be delivered? 2 Summary 2 Appendices Performance indicators 2 Documents reviewed 2 Reality checks undertaken 2 List of people interviewed 2 Positive practice 34 Thurrock Borough Council - Housing Services p 3 The Housing Inspectorate Summary 1 Thurrock Borough Council is a unitary authority in the South East of England which lies on the River Thames to the east of London. The population is 143,200 of which 4.7 per cent are from black and minority ethnic (BME) communities. The main settlements are Grays, Corringham, South Ockendon, Chadwell St Mary, Stanford le Hope and Tilbury. 2 The council is Conservative led with 28 of the 49 seats. 3 The council employs 5,477 staff across all services. 4 The services inspected consist of housing strategy and enabling, homelessness and housing advice and resident involvement ...