Thousands of city's homes fail to meet standards

About 23,000 Birmingham homes had serious health and safety issues

Thousands of social homes in Birmingham do not meet government standards, a report has found.

About 23,000 homes had serious health and safety issues including overdue asbestos checks as well as fire and electrical risks, the Regulator of Social Housing (RSH) review found.

The city council has breached consumer standards, it said.

The city council said it was "very sorry" about the failures and it was "acting quickly" to improve services.

The RSH concluded that "thousands of council tenants were at potential risk of serious harm" as a result of the council's failures.

Key findings included:

• 17,000 overdue asbestos surveys

• 15,500 electrical safety inspections were late

• More than 1,000 fire risk assessments, mainly affecting low-rise housing blocks had not been completed

• More than 1,000 responses to complaints from tenants were overdue

• The council "failed to treat tenants with fairness and respect"

• 39% of council properties did not comply with the the government's Decent Homes Standard (DHS)

"Birmingham City Council has failed thousands of tenants and it needs to act now to put things right," said Kate Dodsworth, director of consumer regulation at RSH.

"It is unacceptable that so many of its tenants are living in non-decent homes, and that thousands of health and safety surveys haven't been completed."

Responding to the findings, Housing Secretary Michael Gove said he would seek an urgent meeting "to demand improvement for tenants".

An investigation by the BBC in March found a huge backlog of repairs to social housing

In March, an investigation by BBC Radio WM found 428 council tenants in Birmingham were waiting for emergency repairs.

A backlog of 10,000 repairs across Birmingham's 60,000 council properties was uncovered with tenants describing the impact of the "squalor" on their mental health.

The council quickly apologised following the RSH findings and said it was "determined to address these issues quickly and [we] have already developed a robust action plan to monitor and track improvements in an efficient way".

"We are very sorry that the council has failed to deliver the quality of service that tenants expect within their home and we understand that the statement issued by the Regulator of Social Housing may have made some tenants feel distressed or worried," chief executive Deborah Cadman and strategic director for city housing Paul Langford said in a joint statement.

"We want to reassure all our tenants that acting quickly to improve the quality of service in these areas is our top priority.

"As part of our response to this challenge, in recent months we have put in place a new senior leadership team with the City Housing Directorate."

'Listen to us'

Kayleigh Kimberley shares her flat with her seven-year-old son and her window has been broken for years

One of the people who spoke to BBC Radio WM in March was Kayleigh Kimberley, who lives in a towerblock in Northfield.

She said she has been waiting three years for the council to fix a broken window latch in her fourth-floor flat.

Reacting to Wednesday's findings, she said she was not surprised.

"If they were that worried they would have fixed all the problems when we first spoke about them," she said.

As well as her broken window, she and her neighbours all live with damp and mould after a leak on the block's roof.

Going forward, she said: "Realistically, they [the council] need to listen to us for a start.

"There are big problems they’re leaving – they need to prioritise."

It is the latest in a string of damning reports surrounding Birmingham City Council in recent weeks.

A leaked report uncovered a "dysfunctional climate" at the top of the local authority as well as "levels of misogyny".

That sparked a leadership contest which saw previous council leader Ian Ward step down to be replaced on Tuesday by John Cotton.

Also on Tuesday, the city's Children's Trust was warned it could face legal challenges from families over the level of respite support for their disabled children.

The trust, which in April was rated rated as "good" after years of failings, said it was conducting ongoing reviews into its service.