Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:

To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what recent assessment has he made of the adequacy of the audit policies governing registered providers of social housing; and whether he is taking steps to ensure that registered providers who are found to have (a) overcharged, (b) double-charged, (c) charged for phantom services and (d) made other errors award compensation to tenants and residents.

The Department does not hold information on service charges for all tenants in the social sector.

The Government strongly believes that service charges should be transparent and communicated effectively. The Government believes that there should be a clear route to challenge or redress if things go wrong.

As announced at the Autumn Statement on 17 November 2022, an increase in the cap on social housing rents has been set at 7% for 2023-24. This followed the consultation we carried out last year, which is available here. We published an Impact Assessment alongside the consultation and will publish a final Impact Assessment in due course.