Two board members of Shelter who have links with the Grenfell Towers fire tragedy have resigned, according to a report in The Guardian.
The newspaper says the two who quit are Shelter’s chairman Sir Derek Myers, a former chief executive of Kensington and Chelsea council, and the trustee Tony Rice, who is chairman of Xerxes Equity, the sole shareholder in Omnis Exteriors – allegedly the company that sold the cladding used on the tower.
The Guardian says that on Friday afternoon, Shelter confirmed the pair had resigned from the board but offered no reasons for their departure.
A statement from Shelter’s interim chief executive, Graeme Brown, says: “Tony Rice has resigned as a trustee of Shelter and the chair of the board of trustees, Sir Derek Myers, has also resigned. The role of trustee is entirely voluntary and unpaid, and we wish them the best for the future.”
The Guardian also reports that it has seen an internal staff email from Shelter union representatives sent last week, suggesting that although Shelter’s frontline services had been quick to provide practical help to those affected by the fire, many staff had expressed discontent that the charity “had been slow to speak publicly about the event”.
Shelter has moved much of its focus in recent years from campaigning on homelessness to campaigning against what it sees as poor private rental sector provision for tenants.
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As an ethical and responsible landlord I *used* to make an annual donation to Shelter thinking it was a good cause and believing that as someone in the property business it was the right thing to do to support an organisation that not only helped homeless people but - I thought - gave useful legal advice to tenants and perhaps helped them better understand not only their rights but also obligations.
I did that from 1996 (when I started) until probably about 2009 or 2010.
There are several reasons I not only abandoned my support for them but am happy to make often strongly negative comments about them. The main one being the way - in my opinion - they have become so political. Their politics seems to be one sided; usually focusing on generating adverse press and negativity against landlords who they appear always to distrust and view as 'in the wrong' or 'likely to be in the wrong' even though a great many - like us - certainly aren't, and all the tenants are depending on them.
Worse still, in my opinion, Shelter have a long been canvassing and campaigning (in an either very misguided or more likely cynical and self-interested way) to bring more and more red tape and pointless legislation to the private rental sector.
They also seem keen to erode and undermine landlords rights - I've written about this here before - Shelter (and generally most left wing organisations and politicians with an interest in rented property) seem to want to put the clock back to the time before s.21 notices allowing landlords to have their properties back, i.e. regain vacant possession, but (and this is vitally important) with "no fault" and "mandatory". Prior to that most tenants were in effect "sitting tenants" of one sort or another. It was the introduction of the Section 21 Notice (and even more so its further deregulation) that caused the whole rental market to blossom in this country, and finally made it worth while for people to invest in property *and* rent it out.
Anyhow, it seems to be the way the world is going and there's probably not much we can do about it - certainly not during my "numbered days" anyhow. Oh well.
i forgot to add.... and they often seem to give our tenants wrong or bad advice, even to the extent of sometimes advising or encouraging them to in effect 'scam' us! Disgraceful.
i forgot to add.... and they often seem to give our tenants wrong or bad advice, even to the extent of sometimes advising or encouraging them to in effect 'scam' us! Disgraceful.
Shelter are a shambles of an organisation! How on earth they feel it is ethical to tell tenants to not pay their rent so they are evicted is beyond me.
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