Q&A round-up: How can your housing association adapt to localism?

Dr Tim Brown is director of the Centre for Comparative Housing Research at De Montfort University The crucial issue is where the support for helping community groups will come from. There will be major cuts in council budgets including cutting grants to the voluntary sector, social enterprises and neighbourhood groups. Housing associations will need to put resources into supporting groups and providing expertise, especially in inner city areas. The housing sector needs to show its adaptability across a range of problem areas. The sector should highlight how it can contribute to issues such as unemployment, education, health and crime so that a stronger case can be made for housing modernisation and new build. Northern towns will be hit the hardest. The government figures on council spending power indicates that places such as Blackburn and Hull face cuts of 8.9% in 2011/12. At the same time housing market pathfinder funding has been abruptly halted so that in some areas contractual obligations for 2010/11 are problematic. Colin Smith is a director at WS Planning Localised targets need to be founded on evidence. As the focus is on neighbourhoods and neighbourhood plans, this raises issues of how these are defined and how the plans will be produced. Who will provide a strategic overview to ensure the neighbourhood plans knit together in a cohesive framework is still unclear. It is important to ensure that everyone has access to the process. We need to engage not only with those who are educated, literate and use the internet but also those who don't have access to electronic media or would rather give their views in an alternative way. Nimbyism may increase as local communities become a greater part of the process. There is a great danger of only "nice" development being authorised with powers being given to the general community. To counter this, housing associations will need to do a lot more work in breaking people's perceptions of what affordable and social housing is. Brian Robson is a policy officer at the National Housing Federation There are three key parts of the bill for the housing sector. Firstly changes to the way housing associations manage and run their existing stock. Secondly major reforms in the way we gain planning permission to create new homes, and finally a real shift in the powers of our most significant partners locally. There needs to be greater grassroots funding for community-led housing. Although the community right to build is useful in progressing schemes, in reality most areas seeking to develop community-led housing have been more challenged by funding issues than planning. A good resource is the Community Land Trust. Andrew Carter is director of policy and research at Centre for Cities Cities should be encouraged to respond to the strengths and weaknesses of their local economy. The "new homes bonus" focuses on growth and is likely to be less suitable for cities adapting to economic change and population decline. For some, a locally determined strategy may be more appropriate than focusing on commercial developments and additional housing. Getting community buy-in to plans should help development to take place. This will only work if the incentives to develop are big enough. Currently, it remains a concern in cities that are most likely to grow jobs and where local residents are most likely to be opposed to development. The "new homes bonus" will only appeal to those councils already planning new housing. It is likely to suffer from dead weight and additional issues, only being taken up by councils already developing. There is an insufficient incentive to encourage other places to build houses where they have traditionally resisted doing so. Cities that have been most reliant on grant money to part-finance regeneration and house-building will be hit the hardest. To a large extent this type of money has gone so without the funds to subsidise private house building and social housing, houses in these places will be constrained. We need to think not only from a housing perspective but also from an economy perspective. Authorities need to better integrate new housing development and existing housing maintenance and refurbishment with consumer preferences. What sort of housing do people want and where? Paul Smith has worked in the social housing sector for over 20 years and currently works for the National Housing Federation Existing skills will need to be reshuffled. Housing management will need to provide wider support, housing organisations need to offer more employment advice for residents and development teams will need to strengthen skills in communication, engagement and consultation. Welfare and tenancy reforms could fundamentally change the landlord-tenant relationship. There is a danger that landlords will be seen as agents of authority as they seek more information about their residents circumstances. David Cowans is group chief executive at Places for People Local communities must be involved at every stage to ensure accountability. Local people should be engaged from planning to neighbourhood development and management as a method of holding local government and developers to account. This content is brought to you by Guardian Professional. For more like this join the housing network