11 November 2005
Small housing associations have been promised less form-filling as the Housing Corporation continues its purge on red tape.
From next year, the amount of information that landlords with fewer than 250 homes will have to give their regulator is being cut by two-thirds, with one quarterly financial return scrapped completely.
In addition, associations will be expected to make future annual statistical returns on-line, so reducing paper and data handling costs.
Jon Rouse, the corporation's chief executive, said it wanted to reduce the burden on all registered social landlords so that money went towards frontline services.
'Our approach to regulation involves a programme of massive simplification and a clear route map to an increasingly risk-led approach,' he said.
An independent review of the information RSLs must give the corporation and other organisations, chaired by Sir Les Elton, is expected to be completed early next year.
The corporation is also testing a new national database that it hopes will ease record-keeping by landlords.
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