Responsible Housing

The European Responsible Housing Initiative & Awards

Tenant’s empowerment

The IUT has always claimed that social housing is not only about providing people with “a roof over their head”, but it should encompass a set of responsible practices to effectively achieve the social inclusion of residents. This means several things to tenants: involvement in decisions, proximity to services and jobs, provision of relevant information and training opportunities, etc.

Following this vision, the IUT joined a European partnership working on Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) consisting of Housing Europe and DELPHIS, a French network of social housing providers. In April 2013 the three partners kick-started the European Responsible Housing Initiative – ERHIN – a project co-financed by European Commission’s DG Enterprise.

 

ERHIN aims at promoting social responsibility in the housing sector through the creation of a voluntary framework at the European level. The main idea behind responsible housing is to improve tenants’ conditions through fair relations and structured dialogue between landlords and their stakeholders, including tenants associations. The first step in the project was the creation of a European stakeholder forum which consisted of representatives of national tenants associations, housing providers, chartered surveyors, family associations, investment banks, civil society and public employer organizations, and local authorities. Barbara Steenbergen, Head of the IUT liaison office to the EU, chaired the stakeholder forum.

The first ERHIN “stakeholder forum” was convened at the EU Representation of the City of Vienna, on 7 November 2013. Tenants’ view was voiced by several IUT members i.e. CNL, DMB, and Woonbond, which promoted several ideas: “co-determination” in the rental sector i.e. tenants having a role in the management of housing companies (Zuhse, DMB); the need of social housing estates “close to services and jobs” (Eddie Jacquemart, la CNL); and last but not least, the proposal of “minimum energy standards in the rental sector” (Ronald Paping, Woonbond). The first meeting led to the definition of “responsible housing”, and the definition of assessment criteria for the first European CSR Awards in the sector. The ERHIN stakeholder forum has also drafted the Responsible Housing Declaration and CSR Code of Conduct.

The IUT continued the promotion of EHRIN after the formal project ended (EC financing ended in November 2014). An important result achieved in 2015 was North-Rhine Westphalia’s signature of the European Declaration by its housing Minister Michael Groshek. NRW is a German Land counting 18 million inhabitants. North Rhine Westphalia was followed by EURHONET, a European network gathering housing providers from 6 different countries (France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Sweden and UK), a further step towards responsible and affordable housing in Europe.

European Responsible Housing Awards

The EHRIN was carried out between April 2013 and October 2014, to lead the way towards better embedding CSR in the social housing sector, through awareness-raising, transfer of knowledge and tools and stakeholder dialogue at the European level. Since then, the consortium kept the Initiative alive by organising the 2016 and the 2019 editions of the European Responsible Housing Awards. The work for the next steps has already started. Stay tuned to www.responsiblehousing.eu

  • 2014 edition
    More than 70 projects competed and 25 were shortlisted in the first-ever edition of the European Responsible Housing Awards
  • 2016 edition
    62 innovative ideas from 9 European countries were submitted in the 2nd edition of the Awards, while the Ceremony was held at the European Committee of the Regions.
  • 2019 edition
    The 3rd edition of the Responsible Housing Awards saw a record-breaking number of 87 submissions across five categories from 16 countries. The ceremony was part of the International Social Housing Festival in Lyon.
  • 2022 edition
    The 4th edition of the Responsible Housing Awards was launched in September 2021 and will take place in Helsinki in June 2022 during the Social Housing Festival. Read more here.
    Read our IUT special report about the awards here: Special report: European Responsible Housing Awards (ERHA).

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