Wandsworth’s housing budget has exploded — and the blame lies squarely at the council’s own door. Years of ignoring damp, mould, and disrepair complaints have triggered a surge in legal claims and emergency works, leaving the council nearly £40 million over budget.
Now, millions more in taxpayers’ money is being poured into rushed tech fixes and costly surveys — with little scrutiny and no guarantee of results.
At this week’s Housing Overview and Scrutiny Committee, councillors showed signs of waking up to the scale of the crisis. But while some challenged the council’s performance, others overlooked or failed to question major outlays, allowing nearly £1.5 million in new commitments to pass with minimal scrutiny.
The overspend: growing every month
The council’s Housing Revenue Account (HRA) overspend has grown steadily month by month. In December 2024 it stood at £18.3 million. By January it had jumped to £26.3 million, and then again to £28.6 million in February. By April, it reached £32.4 million — and the final outturn for 2024–25 confirmed a total drawdown of £38.9 million from reserves.
That’s a 112% increase in just six months.
| Report Date | Forecast HRA Overspend | Change |
|---|---|---|
| Dec 2024 | £18.3 million | — |
| Jan 2025 | £26.3 million | +£8.0m |
| Feb 2025 | £28.6 million | +£2.3m |
| Apr 2025 | £32.4 million | +£3.8m |
| Jun 2025 | £38.9 million | +£6.5m |
The spiralling costs are being driven by a combination of day-to-day repairs, inflation-linked contract increases, and a surge in legal claims over disrepair — many of which stem from damp, mould, and poor communication. These pressures have forced the council to draw repeatedly on reserves while also green-lighting new spending on digital tools, surveys, and staffing without clear long-term savings or outcomes.
£52,000 on iPads: nodded through in seconds
The most visible outlay was £52,300 for 60 iPads and a one-year software licence to allow damp and mould inspectors to fill in forms on-site using a newly developed digital workflow.
While councillors spent time discussing the challenges facing inspection teams, not one questioned the value of the iPad expenditure. There was no scrutiny of whether fewer devices could be shared across teams, whether cheaper models had been considered, or whether the digital form alone would address systemic issues with how complaints are followed up.
£560,000 surveillance app: costly gamble, not discussed
Earlier this month, the council confirmed it would spend £560,000 over three years developing and operating a new in-house “occupancy verification” system for tenants in temporary accommodation.
The scheme will text residents multiple times per month asking them to share location data and submit a selfie to confirm they still live at the property. It follows revelations that around 7% of temporary accommodation placements were empty, abandoned, or misused.
The tool remains untested beyond a small staff pilot. Participation cannot be enforced, and failed check-ins will still require officer follow-up. There is no indication the tool will be effective at scale, and no existing scrutiny mechanism to monitor its performance. Despite the cost and risk, it went unmentioned at the committee.
£917,353 stock survey: necessary, but vague and potentially inefficient
One item that did receive some discussion was the £917,353 contract for a full stock condition survey across the borough’s council housing. The council has commissioned Pennington Choices to inspect every council property over five years.
The work includes internal and external visual inspections of all dwellings and communal areas, and assessments of building components such as windows, doors, heating systems and kitchens. The council previously relied on 10–15% sampling — a method the housing regulator criticised as inadequate.
But councillors were told very little about how the money would be spent per unit, what the risk is of missing properties, or what happens if tenants don’t allow access. Cllr Govindia warned: “We could spend nearly a million and still not know the risk if tenants won’t let inspectors in.”
Officers admitted access refusals could be an issue, but provided no contingency plan. Nor were costs benchmarked or efficiency guarantees explained.
Legal claims mounting — but still little sign of real culture change
During discussion of the council’s annual housing complaints report, councillors were presented with stark evidence about what’s driving the sharp rise in disrepair claims and legal liabilities — which now form a major part of the £38.9 million overspend.
According to the report, 68% of complaints relate to service delays or failures, and 26% to staff attitude. Cllr Corner described the figures as:
“Quite striking… if we can get the service right, and our very hardworking teams’ customer service right, then we can bear down significantly on the incoming complaints.”
But instead of acknowledging internal failings, the Cabinet Member for Housing, Cllr Ayden Dikerdem, framed the problem largely as a result of external pressure and opportunism. He said:
“We’re entering a climate in which the housing ombudsman is likely to be much more aggressive… we’re entering into a much more, I don’t want to say kind of libellous period, but my Instagram is just bombarded with claims support legal officers.”
He also implied that some residents deliberately obstruct mould and damp inspections in the hope of making a legal claim:
“We know that some people won’t give us access to do the mould and damp because some lawyer will have told them they can get a claim…”
This narrative — focused on external threats rather than internal failures — reflects a broader tone of defensiveness. While officers stressed that the council is now more transparent and that complaints data has led to policy changes, those changes were not detailed in the meeting. And there was no evidence that senior leadership is challenging the deep-rooted service failures described in the data.
Officers did confirm that compensation for Stage 2 complaints typically ranges between £200 and £700, and that rulings from the Housing Ombudsman often increase these sums. A breakdown of annual payouts has been promised in the council’s autumn finance report — but for now, the growing financial consequences remain obscured behind vague promises of learning.
Despite months of criticism and a damning downgrade from the Regulator of Social Housing, the council continues to respond with blame-shifting and stopgap solutions — not the structural reform or cultural reset that residents were promised.
Expensive fixes, but no structural change
The council has faced months of pressure over the failures that led to its regulatory downgrade — poor oversight, weak inspection processes, and serious breakdowns in communication with residents.
But while the cash is now flowing, the scrutiny is not. Money is being poured into digital tools and broad surveys with no guarantee of results, and little sign that the council’s internal culture is shifting to match its spending.
Until serious questions are asked about the effectiveness, value, and strategic logic of these responses, Wandsworth risks repeating the mistakes that got it here — only now at a far greater cost.
