East Kent Housing Equality Report
1. How we have collected equality information and used
it
Diversity data on our staff and customers (service
users)
Staff
What we are able to provide:
- the race, disability, gender and age distribution of our
workforce
- an indication of likely representation on sexual orientation
and religion and belief, provided that no-one can be identified as
a result
Read
Findings of our staff diversity survey 2011-12
What we are unable to
provide:
- success rates of job applicants
- take-up of training opportunities
- applications for promotion and success rates
- applications for flexible working and success rates
- other reasons for termination like redundancy and
retirement
- length of service/time on pay grade
- pay gap for other protected groups
- disaggregated information on return to work rates after
maternity leave
- an indication of any issues for transsexual staff, based on our
engagement with transsexual staff or voluntary groups
- gender pay gap information
How we will address these
gaps:
As a relatively new organisation we do not
have data in these areas. Collation of this data will be built into
our strategy and action plan and published annually.
Customers (service users)
What we are able to provide:
- A comprehensive breakdown of the overall population of each
district
- a detailed analysis of our tenants and leaseholders by
preferred communication method
- Limited data at each area by protected characteristic/diversity
group
Mosaic profile
Kent County Council’s Research and Intelligence
unit were commissioned to profile East Kent Housing’s customers
using the customer segmentation tool Mosaic. Read our
East Kent Housing Trust Mosaic analysis
The use of Mosaic has identified the key
characteristics of the tenants and leaseholders of council
properties in East Kent and also their preferred methods of
communication. The information has been used to help develop
communication strategies to increase engagement and awareness
amongst the key customer groups. This will also help us to identify
alternative methods of communications with an aim to reduce
communication costs and engage more effectively with all
groups.
District profiles
Kent County Council’s Research and
Intelligence unit have also compiled profiles of each district in
terms of overall population which present diversity breakdowns by
age, ethnicity, gender, religion, disability. It has been used to
assess life expectancy and deprivation levels across the
region.
KCC district profiles
East Kent Housing tenant diversity
profile
We have limited data provided by each area
that covers some (but not all) protected characteristics.
East
Kent Housing tenant diversity profile
We have information on some our potential
service users based on this analysis of applicants on the housing
needs register.
Diversity data
on HNR applicants
What we are unable to provide:
- A comprehensive breakdown by diversity for all tenants and
leaseholders (overall and by area) that is measured in a consistent
way
- Information relating to all protected characteristics
How we will address these gaps:
Equality information collated so far indicates
a very basic level of diversity data, with significant gaps in
relation to Disability, Ethnicity, Religion and Sexual Orientation.
These will be addressed in year one (2011-12) through the
completion of a comprehensive tenant profiling exercise across all
four districts. This will be carried out initially as a postal
survey, but where returns are low, those areas will be mapped and a
more target approach adopted in order to reach all groups
successfully.
This information will be used to
assess our performance in relation to furthering the aims of the
duty, especially around outcomes including:
- Access to services
- Satisfaction with services
- Complaints
Where possible, this will be broken down by
protected group
Consultation and engagement with
protected groups
Each area has at least one main tenant group
which forms a large part of each Area Board. We use the governance
structure of the main Board, Area Boards and sub-committees to help
us develop key policies and strategies. Recent examples include:
Health and Safety, Equality and Diversity and our Comments,
Complaints and Compliments scheme.
Each area has carried out consultation in
relation to specific areas such as the repairs contract, voids
contract and monitoring and adaptations to properties. Most of this
consultation has been ad-hoc with efforts made to engage with
people most likely to use the service.
Canterbury is the only area with a
comprehensive resident involvement structure, which includes:
sheltered forum, leaseholder forum, young tenants’ forum,
disability forum as well as a tenant led performance monitoring
group and individual service review groups. Sitting under this
structure are the sheltered service improvement group, repairs
monitoring group, talk housing group and informal tenant focus
groups.
As well as a means to consult on key policies
and strategies, these groups have been used to plan and monitor
estate surveys, fun days and events, general surveys and estate
inspections.
Tenant involvement
strategy for Canterbury
Tenant involvement
structure for Canterbury
You can read more about tenant involvement
in:
Information and access
General information
We publish general information on the full
range of our services through newsletters, our website and local
offices. Most key documents can be made available in different
formats such as Braille, large print or audio. Translations are
available upon request.
We have worked to establish a strong corporate
identity through branding and promotion of activities and schemes
at tenant road shows and events, aimed at engaging directly with
our service users. However, we have taken account of feedback from
our customers and kept certain key functions and contacts local. In
practice this means having local variations to information we
provide.
Specific information
We also produce information related to each
service area which is available on line and in hard copy. Examples
include: tenant compacts, repairs handbooks, leaflets, posters and
estate newsletters.
Information on how we have met the TSA
standards which includes understanding and responding to
the diverse needs of our tenants can be found in the
Annual reports for each area.
The annual reports also highlight key
performance information and satisfaction levels as well as
adaptations and improvements we have made to properties.