News from the Third Sector Research Centre (TSRC)

Service Delivery and Housing Workstreams

Third sector organisations are increasingly central to the provision of Public Services in the UK. This role has been developing quickly, both under the previous Labour government and the Coalition government. But it is not always well understood or evidenced, and is sometimes controversial. The Third Sector Research Centre (TSRC http://www.tsrc.ac.uk/) was initially funded for five years (2008-13) by the Cabinet Office and ESRC to undertake research in this field. David Mullins leads the Service Delivery and Housing Workstreams within TSRC.
Over the past three years the centre has produced nearly 80 working papers; 20 of them on public services and a dozen on housing including scoping studies of tenant and resident organisations, co-operative and mutuals, homelessness and advice organisations, housing associations and self-help housing; projects on service delivery partnerships, self-help housing, accommodation for ex-offenders and community investment by social housing organisations all of which can be freely accessed at http://www.tsrc.ac.uk/Publications/tabid/500/Default.aspx. Collaboration: David Mullins, Nick Acheson University of Ulster, Jenny Muir Queens University Belfast

Third Sector Partnerships for Service Delivery: Housing procurement and housing support services in Northern Ireland

Recent TSRC housing projects included a case study for the ‘Third Sector Partnerships for Service Delivery’ project on housing partnerships in Northern Ireland undertaken by David Mullins in collaboration with Dr Nick Acheson at University of Ulster (TSRC’s Northern Ireland partner) and Dr Jenny Muir at Queens University Belfast (an HSA Committee Member). The case study focused on the two largest publicly funded programmes delivered by third sector organisations in Northern Ireland - Supporting People and new social housing. It attracted the interest of the Northern Ireland Housing Executive who have now funded a fuller follow up study by David, Nick and Jenny, which will be completed in 2012.
The project is extremely timely in exploring the impact of policy changes under devolved government on the shape of the third sector in housing and the changing nature of partnerships. As yet there has been little research into the impact of either Supporting People or procurement changes on third sector partnerships in NI except the baseline study by this project team. The research will provide analysis and recommendations specific to the region, to inform policy and practice, while also making use of and contributing to the UK literature. The project provides an opportunity to deepen our understanding of partnership impact by exploring the perspectives of large and small associations within procurement groups and different types of support and housing providers within Supporting People partnerships. This will provide a fuller understanding of the policy options and consequences of the NI Government’s role in relation to third sector housing partnerships.

Self-Help Housing

Following three initial working papers and a consultation at Windsor with Building and Social Housing Foundation who published two reports on self-help housing, TSRC has continued to work with self-help housing.org to monitor the involvement of community based self-help organisations within the £10 million empty homes programme. The impact of earlier work has been highlighted by the large number of new community based groups expressing an interest in the Empty Homes Programme, and agreement by CLG and HCA to a Community Grants fund to enable such groups to be directly funded, rather than having to work through a registered housing provider. Further research is being undertaken on self-help housing including an Honorary Fellowship with Tom Moore, now of Building and Social Housing Foundation, drawing lessons from his work on community landtrusts for application to the self-help housing sector. Further papers by David Mullins, Simon Teasdale and Patricia Jones on self-help housing are forthcoming.

Special edition of Housing Studies

David Mullins is editing a special issue of the journal Housing Studies on social enterprise and hybridity in the housing sector. This is due for publication in Summer 2012. It builds on a plenary session chaired by David on the same topic at the European Network for Housing Research in Toulouse in July 2011.

Think piece on community investment and community empowerment

David Mullins was commissioned by HACT to produce a think piece on community investment and community empowerment. The think piece was presented at the TSRC/HACT seminar in June 2011 and was later presented at events held with the Centre for Social Impact in Sydney, Australia and The Community Housing Providers Forum and Swinburne Foundation in Sydney, Australia. Back home the think piece is informing HACT’s new Strategic Framework and is at the core of a Knowledge Transfer Partnership application being developed by TSRC and HACT. http://www.tsrc.ac.uk/Research/ServiceDeliverySD/Housing/Communityinvestmentandcommunityempowerment/tabid/813/Default.aspx