Spent an enjoyable day this week with housing teams from across Dorset at the very swish Bournemouth Town Hall. Previously a hotel owned and built by a French company at the turn of last century, which explains why it looks more like like a Mairie from the Dordogne than a staid Victorian function place.
I was running them through Easy Law Training’s harassment toolkit, a set of templated letters and court forms that allows hard pressed staff to pull a legally correct tool out of the box, add the name of their client and whack it straight out.
Good to hear that everyone saw their real role in preventing homelessness and giving advice, as one of mediation and negotiation, with the big stick held in reserve for the really badly behaved, which really is the most sensible way of dealing with it.
Nice to meet up with old Mate Lynden Swift, who was the head of homelessness at Bath and North East Somerset, now moved to Weymouth. Also hooked up with Steve Day, head of HMO licensing. I was gobsmacked at how many HMOs Bournemouth actually has. When I was a kid the town comprised mainly of retired people but now its seems to be mainly students.
Amanda, Shelley and Mandela from various Dorset councils pool their resources to get us in to train, which makes it really cost effective
