Sold for a song

The sudden announcement that all Ujima's assets and liabilities had been transferred to the housing group London and Quadrant in January this year, sent shock waves through BME communities as news of it's abrupt demise came fast on the heels of plans for corporation plans for expansion.

The forced transfer of funds estimated to be in the region of at least a billion pounds was made by the Housing Corporation because they said Ujima was facing financial difficulties and could not sustain an independent future.

Quadrant Housing were reported to have picked  up Ujima for £30m when the 30 year old Housing Association has assets in the region of at least  three times that amount.

Largest social landlord

One of the UKs largest social landlords with 46,000 homes, Ujima was wound up in December 2007 by the Housing Corporation and its assets and liabilities transferred to London & Quadrant in January 2008.

The inquiry report into the collapse of Ujima Housing Association, commissioned by the Housing Corporation said that if the Corporation had intervened earlier more effectively the liquidation of Ujima could have been avoided.

"If the Corporation had intervened more effectively during 2006 or even earlier in 2007, it is possible that Ujima might have been able to avoid insolvency, or at least have had more time in which to exercise choice and consult with its tenants and stakeholders in reaching a solution,' the Inquiry report found.

 Poor communication

The review panel, chaired by Simon Braid the head of KPMG's UK charity practice, said the Corporation's investment and regulation arms had not communicated well with each other.

In response to the review the Housing Corporation  has set up a new regulation leadership team,  with the   national deputy directors now responsible for monitoring  the management of housing associations and  reviewing the risk ratings of every association with more than 1000 homes. The Corporation has also introduced quarterly surveys of credit availability and market risk.

The review team also recommended that housing associations that do not cooperate with the regulator's requests for information should be put in a higher risk category to publicly indicate their regulatory problems. It also said the insolvency process for housing associations should be changed.

Different outcome

The report highlights areas where the Housing Corporation could have acted differently in the way it dealt with Ujima, in particular in relation to the speed with which it took regulatory action in late 2006 and early 2007.

 It  comment on the handling of allegations and the Corporation's approach to dealing with challenges in communications with Ujima and has highlighted  new, more graduated, regulatory powers that will be exercised by the Tenant Services Authority, which might have provided a lifeline for the UKs largest housing association had it come earlier.

 Admission

Housing Corporation chairman Peter Dixon admitted: ‘it is possible that Ujima might have been able to avoid insolvency, or at least have had more time in which to exercise choice and consult with its tenants and stakeholders in reaching a solution to its problems, had the corporation intervened at an earlier stage.'

But this Inquiry report is clear that the Housing Corporations failure decisive action could have prevented Ujima from being the first housing association to go bust.

Dixon said: "We are determined to learn the lessons from this independent inquiry, and welcome the inquiry's report's endorsement of the changes we have made to our systems and processes in the light of our experience handling Ujima.'

End of an era

The Housing corporations failures mean that  30 years of Ujima working with the BME community to provide Housing and Care Services that  to tackle the housing problems facing young, black single men and women in London will effectively come to an end.

Their unparalleled specialist knowledge and expertise of the needs of BME communities made them well placed to provide stability and shelter to society's most marginalised groups.  As well as housing Ujima offered 356 hostel bed spaces for single homeless people, for young offenders, and for other vulnerable groups such mental health service users. .

Established in 1977 by a groups activists and entreprenues from within the African Caribbean community, there are concerns from many quarters that a valuable part of Black British  life will be lost forever as the uniqueness of both the provision and culture will be subsumed by Quadrant Housing, who BMH UK have learned,  have no commitment to Ujima's values. 

The inquiry also found that collapse of the Ujima housing association was  also partly  due to a "failure of business management, leadership and governance".

The Report of the Ujima Inquiry