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Abstract

At the very least, Islington’s biggest housing association cannot be accused of being robotic in its responses to criticism.

But One Housing Group has found the personal touch on Twitter, including telling people to “stop being bitchy” and accusing people of being “lovies”, risks just as much criticism, if not more.

In a departure from the more familiar social media output of large organisations, it has begun dispatching a series of bullish tweets in which people have been described as “sounding totally brainwashed” and accused of “jumping the queue for social housing”.

Defiant as eyebrows were raised, the housing association’s account has told its near 2,500 followers that it is no longer just going to deliver straight press statements and will challenge people who they think are unfairly criticising their work online, insisting that: “Social media is the new frontier and we want to forge our own trail.”

The new communications strategy follows an ongoing row over the eviction of 18 tenants living in four joined-up Victorian terraces in Islington Park Street. The residents have been told their landlord is seeking possession of their homes because they have no “proven ­entitlement” to social housing, an issue they fiercely dispute.

A notice to quit expired last week but a court date has not yet been set.

But even web users who are not up to speed with the dispute have been struck by One Housing’s hardball responses online.

In another example of the new style of tweeting, One Housing told a Twitter user: “It must be really depressing to live in a world where everyone around you is so evil.”

As the tone of the output grew more fractious, an actor who uses the site tweeted “I see @official_OHG have changed their social media policy from ‘petulant teenager’ to badly written Bond villain.”

Rather than ignore the criticism, the response came back from One Housing’s account: “More lovies abusing a housing association to preserve their friends cheap dig...”

A spokeswoman for the Islington Park Street tenants said: “Their [OHG’s] response on Twitter has been astounding. Their mockery, taunting and bullying tweets from what is meant to be a professional account is tantamount to abuse. One Sunday, over 100 hostile tweets were sent.”

But Paul Fawcett, One Housing’s assistant director of communications, defended the strategy. He said: “How to manage social media is still a developing area. In any organisation that is facing criticism the default PR situation would be to simply put out a statement and don’t budge, but it became very clear that this was not working.

“We were being accused of being this cold-hearted organisation that is only in it for the cash, which is something we strongly disagree with. We are a responsible housing association.

“We have taken a personal approach. People feel strongly about this and sitting here like a robot, I just don’t think that’s very satisfactory either.”