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Ealing Housing Associations by
Eric Leach
Housing Associations (HAs) came into being in the second half of the 19th century. Their aim was to make accommodation available and affordable for all. The focus was on housing the needy. Early examples are the Peabody Trust (1862) and Guinness Trust (1890). HAs were originally philanthropic and voluntary organisations. HAs were property developers and managers. There are 1,500 HAs in the UK, providing some two million homes for five million residents. After The Housing Acts of 1985 and 1988 HAs began to take over Local Authority roles of building, maintaining and managing what was called ‘Council Housing’. HAs are regulated by Government but don’t seem to be accountable to anyone. They receive £millions of capital grant funding from the Government to build social housing. How different HAs are now from their original 19th century incarnations. In many ways the larger HAs are no different from private builders of housing like Barratt’s, Berkeley Group or Persimmon. As well as building some Social Homes for Rent, they build Shared Ownership and Market Sale properties. They occupy expensive offices and pay their managers and directors extremely generously. Many of the large HAs have grown through acquisitions and mergers. Within their complex structures there are a range of business models. These include Industrial and Provident Societies, Trusts and Co-operatives.
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Dense Housing
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A2Dominion's Green Man Lane
HAs active in Ealing include A2Dominion, Catalyst Housing, Clarion Housing, Metropolitan Thames Valley, Notting Hill Genesis, Network Homes and Peabody Trust. These are some of the biggest HAs in London. In this article we look a little more closely at the activities of four of these HAs in Ealing. A2Dominion The company builds, maintains, sells and manages housing units in Greater London and south east England. In 1947 British Airways Staff Housing Society (BASHS) was formed. MPs Kenneth Baker and George Young set up Acton Housing Association (AHA) in the 1960s. Bakers House in The Grove W5 was AHA’s first social housing scheme in Ealing. In 2001 AHA merged with Cherwell Housing Trust to form Dominion Housing Group (DHG). In 2008 AHA, BASHS, DHG and some other HAs merged to form A2Dominion. Originally the company was a registered Charity and subject to scrutiny by The Charity Commission. Some years ago now the bosses decided to end the Charitable status and like many HAs it is now not subject to scrutiny by anyone. The company is involved in a range of private renting and private ownership offerings. It manages 38,000 housing units. It has a major development and housing management operation underway at Green Man Lane (GML) in West Ealing centre. Putting the People of Ealing First
The GML development process began in 2007. A2Dominion and builders Rydon were chosen in 2009 and demolition started in 2011. 464 Social Rent Council homes are being replaced by 714 mixed tenure units. 95 single bed Social Rent tenants were not offered new accommodation on site. 376 of the new flats will be private sale/Shared Ownership. The new Social Homes for Rent already built are very densely packed together. A gym, Enterprise Units, an expensive public work of art and a community café were all promised. Only the café was delivered and this failed in 2019 and currently lies empty. A Community Centre was promised in 2010 but this has yet to be built. It will probably be 2023 before the development is completed. A2Dominion sites in Ealing recently demolished/cleared are the old Wickes site on Boston Road, Hanwell and the iconic art deco Woolworths building in Broadway West Ealing. The former will provide up to 340 new housing units (65% for private sale), and the latter 120 units (65% private sale). In 2018/19 the turnover of the company was £372.3 million. The net ‘surplus’ (i.e. profit) was £23.9 million. It had an asset base of over £9 billion and 7,601 new housing units in development. The boss earned at least £290,000/ year and 32 other executives earned at least £100,000/year.
