As a customer of The Riverside Group you will have been contacted directly either by email or in writing inviting you to take part in the consultation process, the information contained in that correspondence can be found in this proposals booklet or below for reference

Riverside and One Housing are proposing to come together to create a long-term partnership. We will do this in two steps:

Step one: One Housing Group would join The Riverside Group as a subsidiary. This means that, like now, One Housing Group would have its own Board running the association on a day to day basis. The difference is that One Housing would sit within a Group which is financially much stronger, agreeing its overall plans and direction with Riverside.

Step two: After the first two years of the partnership, we then plan to create a single housing association, with one Board and a consistent approach to delivering better local services and more cost effective support functions such as finance and IT.

Why do we think this is a good thing?

The Boards of Riverside and One Housing recognise that we can be better and stronger together. As charitable housing associations we have very similar values, and want to do the best for our customers and the local communities we serve. We work in different parts of the country, although we both have homes in London and the South East, where there is an opportunity to work together to deliver better and stronger services such as repairs. Crucially, by coming together we think we can create an organisation that can do even more for our customers and communities.

What would this mean for you?

It is only worth coming together if we can deliver real benefits for you, our customers. Put simply, we need to show that we can do more together than we can apart. We have put together a series of pledges or promises, which set out what we think we can achieve over the coming years. These are backed by a realistic financial plan.

What are our pledges?

Whilst we believe that coming together can bring huge benefits to customers, it is also important to be honest, and recognise that partnerships like this are complicated and bring risks. We have thought very carefully about this, and what we can do to make sure these risks do not present us with future problems.

There are also risks if the proposals do not go ahead:

For One Housing Group, some very difficult choices would need to be made about priorities for investment. With fire safety being the number one priority, the opportunity to start to improve energy efficiency and do more regeneration would be very limited.

For Riverside, this would be a missed opportunity to improve the services it delivers, particularly for customers in London and the South East, where our combined scale would provide the chance to deliver better, more cost effective services. Riverside would also miss the opportunity to become more efficient, generating more to invest in improving homes and services.

Charitable housing association, based in Liverpool but working across much of the country, with a subsidiary in Scotland.	Charitable housing association, based in London. Working across the capital and South East.
Founded in 1928, but with roots going back to the late 19th century and the work of The Church Army. Grown over the years with nearly 60,000 homes.	Long-history dating back to 1883. Has come together through previous mergers. Now owns and manages 17,000 homes.
Experience of stock transfers and mergers – track record of delivering promises.	Formed from a network of mergers and stock transfers – continually evolving and improving our services alongside new partners.
Wide range of housing – social and affordable family housing and flats for rent, shared ownership, homes for outright sale.	Wide range of housing – social and affordable family housing and flats for rent, shared ownership, homes for outright sale.
Significant and growing care and support services: focus on older people and homelessness.	Significant and growing care and support services: emphasis on mental health, older people, homelessness.
Active in development and regeneration – building nearly 1,000 homes each year, with large scale regeneration experience in London and the North.	Active in building new homes and estate regeneration in London.

What do we look like together?

One of country’s biggest housing association groups
+75,000 homes.

Strong and stable financial foundations
£600m annual turnover, £5bn assets.

Capacity to do more.
Operating nationally, but with a passion for local services.

Country’s largest housing association provider of supported housing.

A clear voice, able to influence government policy nationally and for London and the North.

The consultation has now closed. You can read about the initial results here.

The responses will now be discussed with our Joint Customer Advisory Panel (JCAP), the group of customers from both organisations covering a variety of tenure types who helped to guide the process. We will also discuss the main messages that have come from the comments that have been mad

e. The JCAP are being supported by TPAS, a leading tenant engagement company who have been serving as an independent advisor.

Once the responses and comments have been collated, they will be presented to the boards of both organisations in November, before they make a final decision about whether to go ahead with the partnership.

Once a decision is made, we will write to all customers to explain the outcome and next steps.

The Regulator of Social Housing has been kept informed of progress throughout.