Housing Governance is our annual event for governance professionals to learn and network. This conference is a chance to build resilience during challenging times. We aim for your team to leave confident in delivering good governance for your organisation.

The agenda for this year’s conference addresses the role of governance in a changing regulatory landscape. The consumer standards enforced from April are the subject of our opening session. We will discuss how governance teams can help boards embed the new requirements and the Regulator’s stronger enforcement powers.

We will explore Regulatory Inspections and how the consumer standards are affecting these. This event will also answer the question: what is the threshold for self-referral when it comes to consumer regulation?

Housing Governance 2024 will also feature sessions on career development, EDI and artificial intelligence. You will also find opportunities for personal and professional development at this event and, of course, there will be plenty of time to meet and network with other governance teams and boards.

What happened at last year's conference?

Housing Governance 2023 taught us a great amount about the current opportunities and risks in housing governance. Rachelle Earwaker of the Joseph Rowntree Foundation shared a brand new report on the impact of the housing crisis in people's households, including social housing residents.
Political advisor, Toby Lloyd spoke about the "huge opportunity gap" in the political debate, which can be filled by our sector.

Kate Dodsworth then spoke about the need to have honest conversations “horizontally and vertically” in our organisations. We also had an important session with Yvonne Arrowsmith from Rochdale Boroughwide Housing (RBH). Yvonne was honest about the failings that took place at RBH. She stressed how you must "get underneath the information you are receiving", which means speaking to residents.

In the afternoon, we had several breakouts and a session on the future of governance. Chair, Tabitha Kassem reflected after the event:

“We are on a journey and that journey is shared. The value of the senior independent directors, governance committees and residents on the board are well recognised but there is no ‘one size fits all’. Although they can and do provide additional assurance and scrutiny, (and personally are what I consider to be incredibly valuable), ensuring we are connected to, listening to, and honest with our tenants is the priority.”

We ended the day with a wonderful speech from Virgin Atlantic and London Olympics customer service expert Linda Moir. She emphasised the importance of personality in customer service and why is it cool to be joyful. Putting residents at the centre of governance was a strong theme throughout the day.