Every organisation needs ‘policies.’ A policy is a general set of rules and principles that the organisation adopts – the policy then guides the action or decision it takes on any particular item or matter. Policies exist to instruct and guide committee members, staff, contractors and anyone else exercising authority on your behalf.

As well as policies dealing with your housing services, you also need to consider policies covering your ‘governance.’ Good governance means:-

• Your management committee or board has control of the organisation and its business
• Your organisation is properly accountable to its members, tenants and the wider community
• Your organisation is clear about what it wants to achieve and has considered the best ways to do so

The purpose of this pageof our web site is to help you devise some of the policies that relate to ‘governance.’
For each policy, links will give you

• Some guidance on the main things to include in your own policy
• An example of a good policy

You should NOT treat these as ‘model’ policies to take off the shelf and put in your own files! Policies on governance must be your OWN documents suitable for your needs.