Dear Ms Hodgson,

 

FOI request: FOI-1011

 

Thank you for your request dated 18/12/2023

 

Your request will be answered by 15/01/2024

 

If you have any queries about this request, please contact me, quoting the
reference number above.

 

Yours sincerely,

 

David White

Head of Information, Safety and Community Services

Directorate of Communities, Environment and Central

Royal Borough of Greenwich

 

*   3^rd Floor, The Woolwich Centre, 35 Wellington Street, London, SE18
6HQ

8 [1]www.royalgreenwich.gov.uk

 

ü Please consider the environment before printing this email

 

 

 

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Dear Ms Hodgson,

 

FOI request: FOI-1011

 

We apologise for the delay in providing the response to your Freedom of
Information request. We do remain committed to responding to your request
and will respond as soon as we are able to do so.

 

 

Yours sincerely,

 

Freedom of Information Officer

Information, Safety and Community Services

Directorate of Communities, Environment and Central

Royal Borough of Greenwich

 

* The Woolwich Centre, 35 Wellington Street, London SE18 6HQ

8 [1]www.royalgreenwich.gov.uk

 

ü Please consider the environment before printing this email

 

 

From: foi <[Greenwich Borough Council request email]>
Sent: 18 December 2023 16:00
To: 'Helen Hodgson' <[FOI #1061294 email]>
Cc: foi <[Greenwich Borough Council request email]>
Subject: FOI-1011: Freedom of Information request - Housing Statistics for
Modern Slavery Survivors

 

Dear Ms Hodgson,

 

FOI request: FOI-1011

 

Thank you for your request dated 18/12/2023

 

Your request will be answered by 15/01/2024

 

If you have any queries about this request, please contact me, quoting the
reference number above.

 

Yours sincerely,

 

David White

Head of Information, Safety and Community Services

Directorate of Communities, Environment and Central

Royal Borough of Greenwich

 

*   3^rd Floor, The Woolwich Centre, 35 Wellington Street, London, SE18
6HQ

8 [2]www.royalgreenwich.gov.uk

 

ü Please consider the environment before printing this email

 

 

 

show quoted sections

Dear Ms Hodgson,

 

Freedom of Information request:  FOI-1011

 

Please accept our sincere apologies for a delay in providing a response to
your Freedom of Information request. We apologise for any inconvenience
this may cause. The service providing you with your response has been
chased today and they do remain committed to responding to your request as
soon as possible.

 

 

Yours sincerely,

 

Freedom of Information Team

Directorate of Communities, Environment and Central

Royal Borough of Greenwich

 

*   3^rd Floor, The Woolwich Centre, 35 Wellington Street, London, SE18
6HQ

8 [1]www.royalgreenwich.gov.uk

 

ü Please consider the environment before printing this email

 

 

show quoted sections

Dear Ms Hodgson,

 

FOI request: FOI-1011

 

Thank you for your request dated 18/12/2023

 

Our response is as follows:

 

Please outline the specific training given to Local Authority frontline
housing staff on modern slavery and human trafficking.

 

The Council’s Safer Communities Service runs a half-day training course
for staff several times each year based on a model developed by Stop the
Traffik and informed by the council’s lead manager having undertaken Stop
the Traffik’s train-the-trainer training.  It covers the Council’s duties
under the Modern Slavery Act, awareness and identification of all
strands/types of modern slavery, how to respond in terms of the National
Referral Mechanism and referral pathways for immediate support for
victims.  The course also builds in trauma-informed awareness of the
impacts on victims and barriers for them to seek help.

 

The course was run twice during the period in question but there were no
frontline housing staff in attendance at those courses although staff from
our housing teams had attended in previous years.

 

The Council’s manager who leads on Modern Slavery also provides casework
advice and guidance for any case of possible Modern Slavery so that an
officer from any team who is unsure what to do or who is dealing with a
complex case can access specialist support and is not reliant on having
attended training in order to provide an appropriate response for
victims.  Staff support was given for 23 cases between January 2022 and
January 2023.

 

In addition to the above, the Housing Inclusion Service abides by the
Housing Act 1996 (as amended by the Homelessness Reduction Act 2017 and
its associated Homelessness Code of Guidance for Local authorities. 
However, this information is exempt as it is reasonably accessible to you
in accordance with section 21(1) of the Act, which provides information is
exempt, and therefore does not have to be disclosed in response to a
request, if it is reasonably accessible to the applicant by other means.

Please use the links below which will provide you with the information you
have requested.

Homeless applications are handled in line with the [1]Housing Act 1996 (as
amended by the [2]Homelessness Reduction Act 2017) and its associated
[3]Homelessness Code of Guidance for Local Authorities.

 

Please also find attached the Council’s internal guidance. The contact
details for the Support for survivors of Modern Slavery set out in
document Appendix A are exempt as these are reasonably accessible to you
in accordance with section 21(1) of the Act, which provides information is
exempt, and therefore does not have to be disclosed in response to a
request, if it is reasonably accessible to the applicant by other means.

Please use the links in the document Appendix A which will provide you
with the information you have requested.

 

Please outline the criteria used to make vulnerability assessments under
Section 189 (1)(c) of 1996 Housing Act.  Please include in the outline how
staff make assessments for people with a positive reasonable grounds or
positive conclusive grounds decision from the National Referral Mechanism.

 

Details of the criteria used to make vulnerability assessments under
Section 189 (1)(c) of 1996 Housing Act, including how staff make
assessments for people with a positive reasonable grounds or positive
conclusive grounds decision from the National Referral Mechanism is exempt
as it is reasonably accessible to you in accordance with section 21(1) of
the Act; which provides information is exempt, and therefore does not have
to be disclosed in response to a request, if it is reasonably accessible
to the applicant by other means.

Please use the links below which will provide you with the information you
have requested.

 

Homeless applications are handled in line with the [4]Housing Act 1996 (as
amended by the [5]Homelessness Reduction Act 2017) and its associated
[6]Homelessness Code of Guidance for Local Authorities. 

 

Please also find attached the Council’s internal guidance.

 

 

How many people with positive reasonable and positive conclusive grounds
decisions (from the National Referral Mechanism) made a homeless
application between January 2023 - June 2023?  Provide totals for each
type of NRM decision (e.g. ‘50 - positive conclusive grounds’, ‘2 -
positive reasonable grounds’). Do note that ‘NRM decision’ refers to the
latest NRM decision an individual has received at the time of writing.

 

Section 12 (1) does not oblige a local authority to comply with a request
for information if the authority estimates that the cost of complying with
the request would exceed the appropriate limit.

 

The Freedom of Information and Data Protection (Appropriate Limit and
Fees) Regulations 2004 (“the Fees Regulations) sets the appropriate limit
at £450 for the public authority in question. Under these Regulations, a
public authority can charge a maximum of £25 per hour for work undertaken
to comply with a request. This equates to 18 hours work.

 

A public authority is only required to provide a reasonable estimate or
breakdown of costs and in putting together its estimate it can take the
following processes into consideration: -

 

 a. Determining whether it holds the information.
 b. Locating the information, or a document which may contain the
information.
 c. Retrieving the information, or a document which may contain the
information, and
 d. Extracting the information from a document containing it.

 

We have estimated the length of time it will take to do the following
tasks in accordance with section 12.

 

Determining whether we hold the information and locating the information,
or a document which may contain the information.

 

The information is held in our housing management systems (Northgate V6,
TRIM and Jigsaw).

 

There are approximately 1936 documents.

 

To retrieve and extract the information one officer will have look through
the Northgate V6, TRIM and Jigsaw data bases.  The process will include
going through any correspondence we have had for each person to see if
this was mentioned. This information is not requested as part of a
homeless application or saved in a specific place and it would mean going
through all the information we have in each case, going through emails,
case notes, documents on the case etc., to see if it was mentioned.

 

In some cases, an application does not lead to a case being created on
V6/Jigsaw but we would need to look through mailboxes for the application
details instead to see if at any point this information was mentioned. 

 

To carry out the above actions would take approximately 20 minutes (15
minutes to locate file and 5 minutes to retrieve and extract the
information. (20 minutes x 1936 records) = 645 hours.

 

Total hours to complete the request equates to 645 hours.

 

We estimate that it will take us in excess of 18 hours to determine the
appropriate material and locate, retrieve and extract the information in
reference to your request. The council is not obliged to comply with this
request because it exceeds the appropriate limit.

 

Section 16 of the Act imposes an obligation on public authorities to
provide advice and assistance to a person making a request, so far as it
is reasonable to do so.

 

In order to provide you with advice and assistance we suggest ask for one
specific month’s data within this time period.

 

 

How many people with positive reasonable grounds and positive conclusive
decisions were assessed as not having a priority need for housing between
January 2023 - June 2023? Provide totals for each type of NRM decision as
above.

 

This information is exempt.   Section 12 (1) does not oblige a local
authority to comply with a request for information if the authority
estimates that the cost of complying with the request would exceed the
appropriate limit.

 

Please refer to the response above for further information.

 

 

How many people with positive reasonable grounds and positive conclusive
grounds decisions made a homeless application between July 2023 and
December 2023? Provide totals for each type of NRM decision as above.

 

This information is exempt.   Section 12 (1) does not oblige a local
authority to comply with a request for information if the authority
estimates that the cost of complying with the request would exceed the
appropriate limit.

 

Please refer to the response above for further information.

 

 

How many people with positive reasonable grounds and positive conclusive
grounds decisions were assessed as not having a priority need for housing
between July 2023 - December 2023? Provide totals for each type of NRM
decision as above.

This information is exempt.   Section 12 (1) does not oblige a local
authority to comply with a request for information if the authority
estimates that the cost of complying with the request would exceed the
appropriate limit.

 

Please refer to the response above for further information.

 

 

If you have any queries about this correspondence, please contact me,
quoting the reference number above.

If you are not satisfied with our response to your request, you can ask
for an Internal Review.  Internal review requests must be submitted within
two months of the date of receipt of the response to your original
request.  If you wish to do this, please contact us in writing, setting
out why you are dissatisfied.

If you are not satisfied with the outcome of the Internal Review, you may
apply directly to the Information Commissioner (ICO) for a decision. 
Generally, the ICO cannot make a decision unless you have exhausted the
Internal Review procedure provided by the Council. You can contact the ICO
by emailing [7][email address], or by post at Customer Contact,
Information Commissioner's Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow,
SK9 5AF.

 

Yours sincerely,

 

David White

Head of Information, Safety and Community Services

Directorate of Communities, Environment and Central

Royal Borough of Greenwich

 

*   3^rd Floor, The Woolwich Centre, 35 Wellington Street, London, SE18
6HQ

8 [8]www.royalgreenwich.gov.uk

ü Please consider the environment before printing this email

 

 

From: foi <[Greenwich Borough Council request email]>
Sent: Tuesday, February 20, 2024 2:16 PM
To: 'Helen Hodgson' <[FOI #1061294 email]>
Cc: foi <[Greenwich Borough Council request email]>
Subject: RE: FOI-1011: Freedom of Information request - Housing Statistics
for Modern Slavery Survivors

 

Dear Ms Hodgson,

 

Freedom of Information request:  FOI-1011

 

Please accept our sincere apologies for a delay in providing a response to
your Freedom of Information request. We apologise for any inconvenience
this may cause. The service providing you with your response has been
chased today and they do remain committed to responding to your request as
soon as possible.

 

 

Yours sincerely,

 

Freedom of Information Team

Directorate of Communities, Environment and Central

Royal Borough of Greenwich

 

*   3^rd Floor, The Woolwich Centre, 35 Wellington Street, London, SE18
6HQ

8 [9]www.royalgreenwich.gov.uk

 

ü Please consider the environment before printing this email

 

 

show quoted sections