It is not clear what Carl Sargeant's reply of 26 June said, but a great deal of water has since passed under the bridge, and the rest of the letter speaks for itself.
Dear Cabinet Secretary,
Thank you for your letter of the 26th of June, in
reply to ours of the 9th of June. We
found it most encouraging.
It is with regret we have to report that our
efforts to contact the shareholders and later the tenants of Tai Cantref, to
advise them as fellow tenants of some of the safeguards they should expect
following any merger, has not been successful; the forums we had hoped to hold
were never called.
We have made some contacts
and we hope to extend these now the vote has been passed. We, as a group, are still willing to show how
an independent tenant body can actively participate and assist a Registered
Social Landlord (RSL), to improve a landlord's understanding of tenant
concerns. In this respect we are still
willing to hold, under supervision, training sessions with any Cantref tenants
interested in forming a tenants' group.
But following the vote our concerns for the tenants
of Tai Cantref have increased. These
are:
1.
If, following an investigation which was so sensitive it could not be published,
suggesting a failure of governance, why was the same board which created this
situation allowed to dictate the conditions of the transfer?
2.
Despite pronouncements, such as, “The board, senior
management and staff place the interests of tenants... at the centre of all we
do” (Cambrian News, 11th of February, 2016), and “Our tenants are our number one priority...” (Kevin
Taylor, interim chair, Cantref web site, 11th of August, 2016), there has not been any
genuine consultation with the tenant body regarding the fact the landlord of
said tenant body is about to change, or of the possible ramifications thereof. We believe this to be a breach of their
statutory duties as a RSL and may be a violation of the Housing Act 1996. Even so, surely a majority of the secure
tenants will have to agree to any transfer before it can proceed?
3.
Following on from the pronouncements, why then, from the time they
decided on their chosen partner, did the board actively block tenants from
becoming shareholders? We understand
there is a rule which allows for not allowing individual applications, but
surely not for a blanket ban on something that directly affects all the tenants
of the company?
4.
When we transferred from Ceredigion County Council we were all given a
legally binding Offer Document, outlining the reasons for the transfer,
what it would entail and what guarantees there would be to protect the tenant's
interests, including provisions for tenants on the (senior) board and the
active participation by a scrutinising group, able to have access to the senior
management. Furthermore, the council
held forums across the county to consult directly with as many tenants as
possible before the transfer.
What
have the tenants of Tai Cantref received?
Nothing but a note stating their tenancy agreements might change. What of those who were deemed as acceptable
as shareholders? What have they seen
prior to the vote on the 10th? The Annual
Report for the previous financial year, which might have shed some light on
the extend of the mess and what needs correcting, has still not been
published. No written reports one month
prior to the vote, giving the reasons for the merger, nor any written
prospectus from Wales & West on how they are to resolve the issues; just
private, individual, verbal briefings, which therefore cannot be collaborated
or substantiated. From the reports we
have seen, these documents were not even made available to the shareholders at
the Special General Meeting (SGM); all they were given was a verbal plea for
the resolution to be passed. On this
basis alone, we wonder if the vote has any standing in law?
Instead,
the shareholders had Penri James, vice-chair of Cantref in the Cambrian News
of the 4th of August, 2016, witter that, “If the merger isn't voted through, we
just don't know what would happen. But
it could be as extreme as Cantref being dissolved if the merger doesn't go
ahead.” This was at least disingenuous
disinformation. As a senior member of a
company board he must have known that all mergers are a form of takeover; any
merger where they are the junior partner means the company will be
dissolved. A sub-division of Wales &
West might retain the name of Tai Cantref but the tenancy agreements will be
with Wales & West, the rents will go to Wales & West and the strategic
decisions affecting the tenants in this region will be determined in Cardiff,
not Newcastle Emlyn.
5.
The same reports state the current board is so incompetent they had not
negotiated any guarantees from Wales & West prior to the vote, including
those on future rents. So much for the
tenants being “at the centre of all we do.”
From what we have heard, Carmarthenshire County Council have already
offered such, including the underwriting of any current debts which Tai Cantref
may have, a rent cap and in some degree the guaranteeing of jobs and offices.
6.
Then there was the SGM itself, where three interesting details came to
light. Firstly, Tai Cantref had already
announced in 2013 that they were up to the WHQ standard. Then there was the revelation that Wales
& West would not be able to bring the Cantref properties to WHQ standard
until 2024. That is a delay of another
eight years. Another eight years the
tenants of Tai Cantref will have to wait until their homes are brought up to
the standard; eleven years after they were told the standard had been reached and
four years after the Welsh Government's deadline!
7.
But it was the third detail which seemed to clarify the situation
regarding the previous two and gave a possible reason as to why the
consultant's report was not published.
Apparently, at the meeting, both the interim chair, Kevin Taylor, and a
former board member, Cynog Dafis, blamed the regulator for the company's
catastrophic failure. For what
reason? For reminding the board they had
a statutory duty to bring their properties to and maintain them at the WHQ
standard, instead of spending their rental income on empire building? If that is the case then we at TCMG are very
angry: the regulator is one of the few active safeguards social tenants have
against obstructive landlords.
We regret having to raise these concerns but
suspect that anyway, sooner or later, they will land on your desk. We humbly suggest this situation cannot
continue. To us, it appears both
companies have been behaving like private-sector corporations, not as social
landlords.
We fear that if the situation is allowed to continue
to a second vote then it will make a mockery of the whole social housing
programme, completely undermining it and allowing other housing associations to
absolve themselves from all aspects of it.
Wherefore then tenant participation? Affordable rent protection? The protection of secure tenant's
rights? The duality of both the Welsh
and English languages in this part of Wales?
Wherefore then the future of building homes which
are affordable to rent? Over the
last thirty years the private sector has singly failed in this regard. Instead, we have seen a proliferation of
three-to-four bedroom houses built for sale, often as second homes, or for
letting at holiday rates, thereby undercutting the Welsh economy by restricting
where local workers can afford to live.
Therefore we request you intervene, to investigate
how these two housing associations have been allowed to get to this position:
of pretending to be acting on behalf of the Cantref tenants while totally
ignoring said tenant's interests; for ignoring all tenant's interests. We request you act soonest to resolve this
issue on behalf of the Cantref tenants and to protect the concept of social
housing.
We look forward to your reply.
Yours faithfully,
Jim Scanlan
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