Who really holds the power? Reform, responsibility and the risk ahead
Thursday 2nd of April 2026
Kai Jackson, Special Membership Projects Lead, Tpas
Recent reforms in social housing were meant to rebalance the system.
Stronger consumer standards. Proactive inspections. Tenant Satisfaction Measures. Awaab’s Law.
On paper, this is a decisive shift. The regulatory dial has moved and the tone from government is clear: tenants must have more power.
But there is a critical distinction that the sector must now confront. Leverage is not the same as power.
And many tenants can feel the difference.
Leverage without authority
The modern framework gives tenants stronger leverage than ever before. They can escalate complaints beyond their landlord. They can trigger regulatory scrutiny. Their satisfaction data is published. Landlords can be inspected and downgraded.
The strengthened role of the Regulator of Social Housing has ended the era of unchallenged landlord authority. But this is reactive power. It activates when something goes wrong.
It does not necessarily give tenants influence over long-term priorities - the appetite for risk a landlord might have, which homes to build and dispose of, or how leaders are paid.
Boards still control the biggest decisions, they still control the information and, crucially, they still define the context in which engagement with tenants happens.
That is structural power.
Reform after tragedy
The death of Awaab Ishak forced a moral reckoning across the sector. Damp and mould were no longer an operational issue - it became a legislative priority. This was necessary.
But it also revealed something deeper: reform followed crisis.
The system did not voluntarily elevate tenant health to existential risk. It required public outrage and political intervention.
That should prompt boards to ask a harder question: are we really leading change, or reacting to pressure?
The boardroom question
Under the current regulatory regime, boards hold ultimate accountability for:
Consumer standards compliance
Health and safety assurance
Financial viability
Governance integrity
These are not administrative obligations. They are fiduciary duties.
Yet many boards still treat tenant harm primarily as operational performance failure rather than governance failure.
If damp and mould is framed as backlog management, it stays with management. If damp and mould is framed as systemic health risk, it belongs on the board risk register.
There is a difference between receiving assurance and interrogating it.
Real accountability requires boards to examine disrepair trends as strategic risk, demand insight into complaint themes, and meet with tenants and communities outside of formal engagement structures.
Most of all, it means testing whether reported satisfaction aligns with real lived experience.
In the same way, if tenant empowerment remains an engagement strategy rather than a governance principle, the power imbalance remains intact.
When movements escalate
History tells us something consistent about social movements. They build coalitions. They pursue legal reform. And if reform does not produce meaningful redistribution of power, they escalate.
Housing has already seen the first two stages. Broad coalitions have formed across identity lines. Legal reform has been enacted.
If tenants do not feel more powerful - not just heard, but influential - what comes next?
The final mechanism any movement holds is economic leverage. In labour history, it was the strike. In civil rights movements, it was coordinated boycott. In housing, it is rent strikes and collective protest.
We are not on the brink of nationwide rent strikes in social housing. Rent compliance remains high. But localised protest? I wonder how many board feel this is entirely plausible in their areas.
Regional mobilisation is increasingly realistic in a digital era.
Cost-of-living pressures remain acute. Institutional trust across sectors is fragile. If tenants perceive reform as procedural rather than transformational, escalation becomes a rational next step.
A choice for boards
The housing sector was always founded on social purpose. Reformers like Octavia Hill did not design housing institutions as compliance machines. They were intended as vehicles of social good.
Boards now sit at a critical juncture.
They can treat tenant empowerment as a regulatory obligation to be satisfied; or a structural redesign of how authority is shared.
They can protect traditional hierarchies; or they can experiment with tenant governance, binding co-decision rights, participatory budgeting and radical transparency.
If boards move decisively and ambitiously, they retain control of the transition.
If they move cautiously and defensively, power will not remain static. It will be redistributed - it will be up to landlords if they want to lead that process.