Get Involved

All of our Care and Support services are registered and inspected by the Care Inspectorate. We are inspected against the Health and Social Care Standards – one of these is ‘Be Included’. This means we will support you to:

• Receive the right information, at the right time and in a way you can understand
• Be supported to make informed choices, so you can control your care and support
• Be included in wider decisions about the way the service is provided, and your suggestions, feedback and concerns are considered
• Be supported to participate fully and actively in your community

You can read the full principles and standards here: Health and Social Care Standards - Scottish Government

Our Participation Officer supports services to provide groups you can take part in, make information accessible, and make links with other agencies and sources of information. Have a look at Citizenship and Participation to find out more.

The Social Care (Self Directed Support) (Scotland) Act 2013 gives people the ability to have more choice and control over their social care. We are committed to the principles of SDS and you can find out more about it here: Self-Directed Support.

The introduction of the Housing (Scotland) Act 2001 created a legal requirement for landlords to actively develop and support tenant participation. All registered social landlords in Scotland must have a tenant participation and consultation policy which will enable 'continuous improvement in landlords' performance in supporting and enabling tenants to participate'.

Tenant participation can be defined in several ways. Ark has chosen to define it as follows: “Tenant participation is about tenants influencing the decisions that we take about housing policies and services. It is a two-way process involving the sharing of information, ideas and plans. It gives an opportunity to empower tenants and makes us more accountable for our actions.”

We recognise that ‘participation’, or ‘taking part’, will mean different things to different people – ranging from simply providing the information that tenants need about our services in a way that can be easily understood, to tenants sharing in decisions about our services. Below are the ways in which Ark tenants can get involved in tenant participation.

Tenants Groups

If you and tenants want to form a tenants group we can help you do this.

What is a Tenants’ Group?

A tenants group is a group of tenants who live in the same area who work together to represent the views of all tenants in the area to help make their neighbourhood a better place to live.

How do I set up a Tenants’ Group?

Tenants’ groups are set up by volunteers. These volunteers live in the community and want to have a say in how it is run and make a difference. There may be a tenants group already set up in your area. You could ask your housing services officer about this. If you would like to set a Group up you could start by finding out if any of your neighbours are interested by speaking. Ark can support you to advertise the group and encourage others to get involved.

What next?

You then need to have a meeting to see how many people are interested and decide what the aims of the group will be and how the group will work. If you decide to be a Registered Residents Association you can get more information about this from your housing services officer or the Scottish government.

Focus Groups

We want to hear tenants’ views on a variety of subjects such as rent levels, repairs, allocations, antisocial behaviour and environmental improvements. Focus groups look at specific parts of the housing service and we will periodically engage with tenants who are interested in these matters. Housing services offers can also arrange tenants’ meetings to gather tenants’ opinions on current issues affecting them or to address local issues.

Tenant Scrutiny Group

This group scrutinizes Ark’s housing services and makes recommendations about what Ark could improve. The scrutiny group gives people who are tenants the chance to have a say in the decision making and governance within Ark. This group provides a way to give tenants more influence, and the ability to hold their service providers to account. It is also an opportunity to develop partnership working between tenants and Ark to deliver excellent services.

The group was first launched in 2015 however following a review in 2020-21 a new group has been formed with external facilitation from Tenant Information Service (TIS). If you want to keep up to date with the Scrutiny Group activities you can find more information on the quarterly Ark Newsletter or on social media sites.

The first activity that the Group did was around the communal garden/landscaping maintenance. The final report can be found here.

As at October 2023, the Group members are:

• Walter Ramage, Grangemouth
• Irene Hart, Forfar
• Jamie Hart, Forfar
• Blane Smith. Forres
• Sally Smith, Forres

If you are an Ark tenant and would like to raise an issue which you would like the Scrutiny Group to consider, or if you are interested in the work of the Scrutiny Group, and would perhaps like to join the Group in future, please contact a member of the housing team by emailing housing@arkha.org.uk. 

Ark News

Ark produces a quarterly newsletter to ensure that tenants are kept involved with all of the work that Ark is undertaking and also to promote opportunities for tenants to get involved. You will find our most recent newsletters below:

Ark News Summer 2023

Ark News Summer 2023 - Easy Read

Get involved - Ark as your support provider

All of our Care and Support services are registered and inspected by the Care Inspectorate. We are inspected against the Health and Social Care Standards – one of these is ‘Be Included’. This means we will support you to:

• Receive the right information, at the right time and in a way you can understand
• Be supported to make informed choices, so you can control your care and support
• Be included in wider decisions about the way the service is provided, and your suggestions, feedback and concerns are considered
• Be supported to participate fully and actively in your community

You can read the full principles and standards here: Health and Social Care Standards - Scottish Government

Our Participation Officer supports services to provide groups you can take part in, make information accessible, and make links with other agencies and sources of information. Have a look at Citizenship and Participation to find out more.

The Social Care (Self Directed Support) (Scotland) Act 2013 gives people the ability to have more choice and control over their social care. We are committed to the principles of SDS and you can find out more about it here: Self-Directed Support.

Get involved - Ark as your landlord 

The Housing (Scotland) Act 2001 made it law for Ark to support tenants with tenant participation. It is important for tenants to be involved in making decisions about how Ark works and what tenants think Ark can do to improve the service that tenants receive.

What is tenant participation?

Allows tenants to involved in the housing services Ark provides Allows tenants to involved in the decision-making process Allows tenants able to impact decisions made by Ark about our housing and related services

Why you should get involved?

You should get involved in tenant participation if you want to:

• work with Ark to make changes have your say on issues affecting your home and
• neighbourhood support other tenants or residents help to address issues in your area such as anti-social behaviour or neighbourhood improvements

How you can get involved?

There are different ways you can get involved with tenant participation:

• Ark Newsletter - the most recent version of our newsletters can be found below:

Ark News Summer 2023

Ark News Summer 2023 - Easy Read 

• Tenant Groups Focus Groups
• Tenant Scrutiny Group

If you would be interested in getting involved in any of the above tenant participation groups contact the housing team and they will be able to provide you with more information.