PRESS RELEASE WINNER SCOTTISH HOUSING COMMITTEE MEMBER AWARD 2007

WINNER: MARTIN VAN DER LEE, 
CHAIR, MANAGEMENT COMMITTEE 
TENANTS FIRST HOUSING CO-OPERATIVE

PETERHEAD MAN SCOOPS NATIONAL HOUSING AWARD ON ST ANDREWS DAY:
Lesley Riddoch, award winning journalist and broadcaster who presents a weekly BBC Radio Scotland current affairs programme, delighted a 350 people strong national housing audience when she announced Tenants First Housing Co-operative’s Chair, Martin Van Der Lee, as the winner of the national and prestigious, “The Scottish Housing Committee Member Award 2007,” sponsored by Dumfries & Galloway Housing Partnership. 
[Last year, Dumfries & Galloway Housing Partnership’s Chair, George Murray won this annual award.] 
The audience was gathered at the opening ceremony of Employers in Voluntary Housing’s annual conference in Fairmont Hotel, St Andrews and Martin’s win represents another triumph for Tenants First Housing Co-operative.

Martin Van Der Lee, as this year’s winner was completely overwhelmed when he accepted a cheque for £250, a commemorative world globe clock and an 18 year old bottle of Glenfiddoch whiskey from Lesley Riddoch.

Background Information:

Martin was nominated for the award by Tenants First Housing Co-operative’s Chief Executive, Sandy Murray. Martin is especially committed to the Co-operative values and was one of the founder members of Co-operative Housing in Scotland. Martin has been appointed a Tenant Assessor with Communities Scotland and has Chaired Tenants First Housing Co-operative through a period of growth with vision and commitment so that the Co-operative is now a stronger organisation with a respected reputation. During a process of amalgamation of the original 6 constituent co-operatives to form Tenants First Housing Co-operative, Martin helped evolve the new organisation with a structure that both represented the Fully Mutual principle and recognised the identity of the different areas within the new Co-operative.

Martin is a very passionate man with good communication skills and in particular is a very good listener. Although self effacing he has self confidence and strength of will in negotiation. Living as he does in the community where there are many Tenants First houses he is approached regularly by other families and non members to discuss difficulties they are encountering with housing issues or wider issues. There is huge respect for him within the community for the way he listens and tries to help without ever comprising the Co-operative or offering easy answers which cannot be delivered. 

Martin has strong views on the need to maximise choice for members and is passionate about the design of houses. It is in relation to these 2 issues that his most obvious achievements can be seen. In 2000 he persuaded Committee Members to visit different projects in Holland to get an insight into alternative ways of doing things. One of the visits was to Arnhem to see Choice Based Lettings in action. The Committee Members were convinced of the merits of the system and adopted it as clear policy objective. This was at a time when choice based Lettings were not generally known about. Regrettably the Co-operative was thwarted in its ambition to introduce it because of its membership of the Combined Housing Register in which it participated through Homechoice. Finally, however the Co-operative along with Castlehill Housing Association withdrew from Homechoice and set up its own Choice Based Lettings, branded as Homehunt NES.

In relation to design, Martin is both passionate and knowledgeable about different construction techniques. Again he utilised knowledge about systems in Holland and elsewhere in the continent to encourage visits to see options. It was as a result of that, that the Co-operative built 5 factory constructed units from Holland at a site in Ballater. The development was the first of its kind in the UK and received widespread national publicity and won the Co-operative two awards. The impetus for the development came from Martin.
 
Martin has also championed the cause of fibre optics and participated in a visit to Neunen in Holland to see what this could achieve. There the town is wholly connected by fibre Optic Networks which both allows the Community to generate their own programmes for distribution and also secures funding by charging commercial suppliers for access to the network. Tenants First are currently seeking funding to include a fibre optic network within the Donside Paper Mill site and hopefully into the adjoining regeneration area of Tillydrone.

Martin’s day to day work within the Co-operative and the commitment he shows in discussing, cajoling, motivating, arguing and leading is a significant achievement.

Martin does all this at the same time as being a full time carer. His wife Kathy is severely disabled as the result of an accident and every time Martin leaves the house he has to have 2 full time carers hired to look after Kathy. The carer role is obviously demanding physically and emotionally which makes his achievements for the Co-operative all the more impressive.