Barnsbury Housing Association has become the smallest landlord to adopt the social housing sector’s ESG reporting standard.

Sustainability for Housing (SfH) praised Barnsbury, which has 299 homes, for adopting the SRS and encouraged other smaller HAs to follow its lead.

SfH said the move demonstrated the size of an organisation is not a barrier to ESG reporting and reiterated the need for organisations of all sizes to create ‘one voice’ for the social housing sector.

Brendan Sarsfield, Chair of SfH, said: “We are delighted that Barnsbury has become the latest adopter of the standard.

“In our conversations with the sector, one of the concerns about adopting the standard often relates to whether it is resource intensive. The fact that a small HA, which operates in one local authority area, can report against the SRS should be reassuring for other smaller groups.

“We want the social housing sector to have one, shared voice on ESG and this means bringing organisations of all sizes and from all corners of the UK on the journey.”

Susan French, Chief Executive of Barnsbury, said: “I am delighted to be able to share our first Environmental, Social & Governance (ESG) report. BHA has a strong commitment to sustainability, to good governance and – as a neighbourhood-based association – to our residents and local communities.  This report gives us the opportunity to let people know what we are doing and the positive impact we are having.

“We knew we had a good story to tell and it was a matter of methodically working our way through the 48 questions. We already held a lot of the relevant data and simply collated the information into a format which can be easily updated year on year.”

The SRS launched in 2020 in response to increasing interest from investors in investments that have genuine ESG credentials.

The Standard aims to harness this interest from investors by providing a uniform framework for adopters to report against. So far it has been adopted by more than 100 housing associations, lenders and investors.

Further reading: https://housingdigital.co.uk/sustainability-for-housing-welcomes-smallest-adopter-of-reporting-standard/