Professor Andy Lymer, Director of CHASM, was pleased to host Dr Roberta Blackman-Woods on Monday 27 January as part of her visit to the University of Birmingham where she presented a guest lecture, alongside the Government and Society Student Experience team and members of the Institute of Local Government Studies (INLOGOV).
Professor Lymer discussed various aspects of CHASM and the Housing and Communities Research Group’s research work related to housing and wellbeing with Dr Blackman-Woods, who has both an academic research background in this area in addition to having held various roles on the Shadow Front Bench in these and related areas during her political career.
Dr Blackman-Woods was Member of Parliament for the City of Durham from 2005 until 2019. Her last role was Shadow Minister for Housing and Planning. Before becoming an MP Dr Blackman-Woods was a Professor of Social Policy and Associate Dean, specialising in housing, at the University of Northumbria. With her wealth of experience in housing policy, Dr Blackman-Woods was extremely interested in the work of CHASM, in particular our Tenant’s Journey Project, exploring the relationship between housing tenure and wellbeing and our report on policy and practice changes needed for the exempt accommodation sector.
Dr Blackman-Woods chose to stand down at the last General Election for family reasons and to enable her to return to academia. Later this year she will take over as Chair of the Board of Northumbria University.