After facilitating the Governance Workshop hosted by the NSW Federation of Housing Associations (NSWFHA) earlier this year, CompliSpace has worked with NSWFHA to develop a fully integrated governance, risk and compliance (GRC) framework specifically for the community housing sector.

With the introduction of the new regulatory regime for community housing providers in NSW, and the proposed move to a national regulatory framework over the next few years, the sector’s GRC challenges are significant.  These challenges are magnified with the introduction of the new workplace health and safety laws (due to commence on 1 January 2012) and the not-for-profit sector reforms that are proposed to be introduced over the next few years.

As CompliSpace has spent considerable time on researching, understanding and mapping the legal and regulatory requirements for the community housing sector in NSW (including meeting with the Housing Registrar and the Community Housing Division of Housing NSW), our team has gained a heightened appreciation of the sector’s need to simplify and streamline internal policy management, information gathering and reporting processes, as well as the critical need for a solution to be fully integrated and, of course, cost-effective.  

Whilst it is relatively easy to generate piles of policy documents, by far the greater challenges are ensuring that the policy documents are maintained up-to-date and that they are fully integrated into the day-to-day operations of an organisation. 

Working with the NSWFHA, CompliSpace has tailored its software programs to comply with the requirements of the NSW Registrar of Housing’s Evidence Guidelines, with future modifications to take into account the NSW Community Housing Division requirements, and the National Community Housing Standards.

As we become more familiar with the functions and priorities of both large and very small CHPs, the next step will involve working with the Federation to facilitate workshops on various aspects of governance, risk and compliance to identify and disseminate best practice within the sector. We are also devising a communications strategy using social media and direct email to keep CHPs aware of changes and developments in the external regulatory environment.