East Ayrshire tenants aired their views

Jul 18 2008 by Clair Fullarton, Kilmarnock Standard

EAST Ayrshire Council gave residents a chance to speak out about housing issues at its fifth Annual Tenants’ Conference earlier this month in Kilmarnock’s Park Hotel.

During the conference, residents cast their votes on three themes identified by the East Ayrshire Tenants’ and Residents’ Federation.

These themes were Allocations, Managing Our Estates and the Scottish Housing Quality Standard, and these were discussed in greater depth at small workshops following the main conference.

In the afternoon, Fiona Lees, Chief Executive of East Ayrshire Council, spoke about how the council had tackled the issues raised at last year’s conference including Repairs, Anti-Social Behaviour and Cleansing, before moving onto the workshop themes for this year’s conference and the council’s commitment to continuous improvement and resident involvement.

Councillor Cathy Morrice and Fiona Lees then presented Registered Tenants’ Organisation certificates to several of the groups represented and also to East Ayrshire Tenants’ and Residents’ Federation whose vice chair, Frank Dawson spoke about the work of the Federation to further develop tenant and resident involvement in improving services and strengthening communities in East Ayrshire.

An interesting and varied question and answer session then followed with Fiona Lees, Chris McAleavey and Gerry Darroch, housing services manager, on the panel.

The event was well attended by tenants and residents from all over East Ayrshire and representatives of 15 tenants’ and residents’ groups.

Councillor Morrice said: “It is vitally important that we keep in touch with the views of our tenants. The conference allowed tenants to discuss key issues which are relevant to them and to find out how to become more involved in the decision making process.”