GreenSquareAccord - Blame The Victim! 

There was a time when controlling the narrative was enough. A few press releases, a well-placed quote in Inside Housing, a photo opportunity next to a smiling CEO. For decades, housing associations used this playbook to maintain their image, distract from their failings, and bury the voices of those they were meant to serve.

But that time is over. And let’s be honest — as honesty is what we should really be focused on — it’s been over for a while.

Social media, smartphones, community-led platforms — these have changed everything. Residents are no longer powerless. When formal complaints are ignored, when safety is neglected, when the truth is spun beyond recognition, we now have the tools to show the world what’s really happening.

It’s no longer that easy to hide a complaint letter in a drawer, a filing cabinet, or a customer service inbox. Providers can still do it — but when they do, we can put it online. That might not seem like much of a threat, but it’s growing. For years, providers like GreenSquareAccord could boast online without fear of public challenge. But this, too, is changing.

I now have just under 11.5k followers on LinkedIn — by far my biggest platform — and more residents are joining in, aware of the false bragging that floods this supposedly “professional” space.

In December 2023, ITV News Meridian ran a story highlighting resident concerns at Maureen Christian House. It featured issues around fire safety, anti-social behaviour, and the persistent sense of abandonment residents had felt. It also featured me, and the platform I’d built — GSA Resident Support — after years of failed communication, failed service, and a wall of silence from GreenSquareAccord.

What viewers didn’t see was the internal chaos the story triggered inside GSA. Because what follows is not just a response to one broadcast — it’s a revealing look at how an organisation responds when it feels its image is under threat. Not with truth. Not with humility. But with spin, legal threats, victim-blaming, and coordinated character assassination.

And we know this, not by guesswork or interpretation, but by their own words.

On 23 November 2023, at 12:04 PM, an internal GSA email was sent with the subject line:
“Media coverage of GSA.”

“Earlier this month, we were successful in securing a legally binding undertaking from an individual, Ben Jenkins... Mr Jenkins has also contacted GSA and individual staff members many hundreds of times over the past years, including on their personal mobile phones and social media accounts, sending messages, phone calls and videos of himself, even after being repeatedly asked to stop this behaviour.”

This message wasn’t a reflection on the issues being raised — it was an attempt to reframe the story. I wasn’t a whistleblower. I was the problem.

“Unfortunately it has become clear that in a number of cases these complaints are then not being passed on to us and so customers have been denied resolution of their issues.”

That line is not only misleading — it’s completely false.

The truth is that I forwarded every single concern raised with me. I even wrote directly to CEO Ruth Cook. But GreenSquareAccord were blocking my emails internally. Complaints weren’t being withheld by me — they were being intercepted by them. This included serious issues around damp, fire safety, and disrepair. GSA deliberately closed off those lines of communication — and then blamed me for the silence.

In a staggering display of dishonesty, they positioned me not only as a nuisance, but as someone standing in the way of justice. That narrative wasn’t based on evidence. It was manufactured.

They told ITV:

“…the complaints in question date back some years and are entirely unrelated to the court proceedings.”

Another lie.

The court proceedings were triggered after the Housing Ombudsman found in my favour.

Just days later, GreenSquareAccord held an internal meeting. They discussed whether to offer compensation to other affected residents — my neighbours. They debated who should sign the apology letter — a letter that lacked any sincerity. And then, they discussed what action they could take to silence me.

The very next action was to instruct their lawyers to proceed — a clear attempt to stop me from sharing the Ombudsman’s findings. This wasn’t about unrelated behaviour. This was about control.

And all of it was documented — spinning through their internal channels like gospel.

While they were framing those emails, I was up north in my camper van. I’d taken a call from an ITV producer and promised to send over the evidence. But I had limited signal and was hotspotting from my phone. I managed to send a few photos and key emails — but the full bundle would have to wait until I returned.

Once I was back, the ITV interview took place. The tone between me and the producer was friendly, open, and curious. That changed — dramatically — after she made contact with GreenSquareAccord.

Steve Hayes, GSA’s Communications Director, had apparently stayed up until midnight crafting a response. He was on the phone first thing the next morning, pushing his version of events, safeguarding the narrative he’s paid to sell.

She called me back. Her tone had shifted. It was colder, more cautious.

“You didn’t tell me you’d been bombarding them with hundreds of emails,” she said.

That was GSA’s line.

I explained: I hadn’t been bombarding anyone. I’d been trying — against every obstruction — to raise serious issues. And I said:
“Let me send you everything now. Let your legal team see it. Let the facts speak.”

I sent bundles — emails, letters, photos, call logs, transcripts — everything I had compiled over the years. I knew it was solid. It had been reviewed by other legal teams, and prepared for a House of Commons debate. More importantly, it was factually accurate.

Once ITV’s legal team reviewed the evidence, the tone shifted again. The conversations warmed. The trust returned. She warned me, off the record:
“Steve Hayes is taking this very personally. He’s not done with this.”

She wasn’t wrong.

What’s remarkable isn’t just that GreenSquareAccord lied — though they did. It’s that they did it so routinely, so casually, that they wrote it all down. Internal staff were confused. Some questioned the messaging. One asked:

“Was this a settlement out of court?”

Another replied:

“It wasn’t a settlement. He gave an undertaking. We asked the court to dismiss the injunction.”

They knew the language was misleading. But they stuck with it.

All of this happened while GSA had disabled resident comments on Facebook. The organisation that claims to put customers “at the heart of everything” had literally cut off their voice. And yet, here was Steve Hayes — GSA’s Communications Director — framing the organisation as the victim. Painting me as dangerous. Feeding the same line to the Chartered Institute of Housing, 4 Million Homes, and other sector bodies. Telling them that GSA’s reputation had been unfairly targeted.

This same Steve Hayes is now a guest speaker at Inside Housing events. Ruth Cooke still sits on the board of the National Housing Federation. And that tells you everything. Because this isn’t just a GreenSquareAccord problem.

This is the sector’s default setting:

Blame the resident. Protect the brand. Silence the story.

It happened at Grenfell. It happens any time a tenant becomes too visible, too persistent, too credible.

The Chartered Institute of Housing never asked for my side. Why? Because Steve Hayes used to work there. Because relationships matter more than truth. Because too many of these institutions still operate in an echo chamber of managed narratives and manufactured consent.

This isn’t about one man or one organisation. It’s about a culture. And a system.

And that’s why this site exists. It’s why I created The Housing Sector. It’s why I host the weekly podcast.

To document. To resist. To make sure that this time — they don’t get to write the ending.