Agenda item

Report of Corporate Director for Growth and City Development

Councillor Jay Hayes, Executive Member for Housing and Planning, and Steve Edlin, Assistant Director of Asset Management, introduced the report seeking approval to award a contract for delivery of a stock condition survey of the Council’s managed housing stock.  They highlighted the following information:

a)  The stock condition survey will enable the Council to get a good understanding of the condition of its housing stock and identify what resources are required and when for maintenance and repairs.

b)  It will enable the Council to take a proactive approach to ensuring that its social housing meets the Government’s Decent Homes standard, including the statutory minimum standard based on the 29 hazards in the Housing Health and Safety Rating System.

c)  Further stock condition surveys will be carried out in the future to ensure that there is always an up-to-date understanding of stock condition.

During discussion and in response to questions from the Committee the following points were made:

d)  The intention is to carry out a stock condition survey every five years.  The last one was carried out in 2017 and the slightly longer time between them was due to challenges with access during the Covid pandemic.

e)  The aim is to carry out the survey within a 12 month period but it is dependent upon getting access to properties and therefore could take up to 18 months.

f)  Access procedures are being reviewed from a safeguarding perspective.  Any safeguarding issues identified before or during the survey either by the Council or Savills will be raised with the appropriate team/ agency.

Resolved to:

(1)  approve a direct award to Savills under ‘Places for People Group Limited’ framework (contract Notice reference: 2002/S 000-029646, published 20 October 2022), and enter into a contract to enable delivery of a full Stock Condition Survey up to 31 July 2025, with an option to extend for 2 years if required; and

(2)  delegate authority to the Assistant Director of Asset Management to set up the required Contract Purchase Agreements to cover the works to be delivered and approve the raising of purchase orders under the signed contract for the duration of the contracts.

Reasons for recommendations

g)  The Council is required to ensure that all of its social housing homes meet the Government’s Decent Homes standard; obligations under the newly introduced Building Safety Act 2022 and Fire Safety Act 2021; and the forthcoming Awaabs Law to ensure that social housing is free from damp and mould, disrepair, Housing Health and Safety Rating System hazards and is structurally sound and safe.  The Council is required to demonstrate its compliance using the consumer standards, specifically for property the safety and quality standard.  A stock condition survey is needed to ensure that the Council can meet these requirements because current data is based on old surveys.  This survey will help ensure the Council is fully compliant with regulations and if not make the Council aware of where it needs to invest to bring failing properties up to standard.

Other options considered

h)  Carrying out the work with internal resources is not achievable to the scale, scope, volume and timescales required at this time.  However, the intention is to bring the service in-house at a later stage.