CHIC CHAT

What’s Happening at CHIC?

At CHIC we continuously review our suite of OJEU compliant contracts and frameworks, adhering to market trends and our members’ needs. Our goal is to offer an effective route to market for all of the maintenance, servicing, construction and new build solutions required by the registered providers who form our membership, so they can generate savings and efficiencies.

The latest of our frameworks is for the supply of Timber Fire Doors. This 4-year framework gives you access to 7 manufacturers across the UK:

For Supply Only

• Permadoor
• Shellen
• West Port

And organisations which supply but also offer an installation service, if required:

• Gerda Security
• Harmony
• Saint Gobain
• Grady Joinery

This framework is accessible through direct appointment or mini competition. CHIC fully supports the procurement process, with dedicated member services, and then we continue to provide commercial supply chain management services. If you would like to find out more, please get in touch with a member of the team at enquiries@chicltd.co.uk

Later this year and into next, we will be introducing several new frameworks to further broaden our service offering and provide you secure PCR 2015 compliant access to a wide range of contractors, suppliers, merchants, consultants and lawyers. Below is a list of new frameworks and when we plan to complete them:

• Newbuild Modular Homes – Manufacturing (October 2020)

• Temporary Fire Protection (November 2020)

• Active Fire and Security (November 2020)

• Cladding Surveys & Removal (January 2021)

• Planned Materials (April 2021)

• Technical Auditing (April 2021)

• Compliance (April 2021)

• Asbestos (April 2021)

• Consultancy (April 2021)

• Lifting Equipment (April 2021)

In Other News

Virtual Festival Housing

Last week, like many organisations in the housing sector, CHIC attended the Housing Virtual Festival. CHIC is a regular attendee at the event in Manchester and fully supported the move to the digital world following recent events. It was great catching up with some of our members and supply chain partners over the 5 days, along with meeting several new potential members.

Many thanks to all who came to our stand, left your virtual stamp, and got in touch. CHIC is proud to have received the highest amount of passport stamps on day 3 of the event. We are looking forward to following up new contacts and hope to return either virtually or to the live event next year.

Our New Website

CHIC has been undergoing a complete website revamp over the last few months. With help from the development team at This is Union, our new site is due to launch later this year with many new features, such as a sophisticated search function to navigate which organisations are on specific framework lots and an improved user interface so you can access the right information quickly and easily, as fast as possible. If you are a member of CHIC and have any content you wish to share through us, please get in touch with our marketing lead Curtis Coulson ccoulson@chicltd.co.uk.

Our updated legal services framework went live in July. We have since received a lot of interest and many of our members have been using the framework to receive expert advice and cost savings across 3 legal workstream lots. Some of the housing specialist law firms on our framework include:

Capsticks is a specialist housing, health and social care law firm, supporting over 200 registered provider and social housing REIT clients on a national scale.

Their team of more than 70 lawyers provides a full service, ranging from expertise in development, planning, construction, corporate and commercial, securitisation, regeneration and finance to housing and leasehold management, tenancy management and disputes, as well as disrepair issues.

Additionally, their unique housing advisory service provides non-legal business solutions and training, particularly on anti-social behaviour, hoarding, safeguarding and employment topics.

Capsticks has been appointed to Lot 1: Corporate, Governance & Finance, Lot 2: Housing & Asset Management and Lot 3: Property & Development of the CHIC framework.

For more information, please contact:

James Howard

Partner

0208 780 4701

James.howard@capsticks.com

Bevan Brittan offer a full-service housing practice that has real strength in depth, alongside market-leading practices in the health and social care and local and central government sectors.

As a UK-Top 100 national law firm they have established a reputation for in-depth housing knowledge, capable of supporting you on any issue. Their friendly and experienced housing lawyers offer a comprehensive range of legal and advisory services and are able to bring in their colleagues working within the health and social care and local and central government sectors to guide you through wider partnership-working activities.

They work with clients as an extension of your team and through the CHIC Lots can offer you a complete range of services:

If you have any legal queries that you would like our assistance with, please contact:

Sarah Greenhalgh

Partner

0370 194 5054

BLM is recognised nationally for its expertise in advising and supporting social landlords, with a reputational strength in litigation. The firm is therefore very pleased to be appointed to Lot 2 for Housing & Asset Management and looks forward to providing legal advice and solutions to the CHIC members across the whole range of services falling within this Lot.

A core team of seven housing and asset management legal specialists, led by key contact, Matthew Hyam, is on hand to deliver focused legal services to the CHIC members. The team has specialism across all services in Lot 2 and is recognised for its strength in disrepair cases. The team also has strong expertise in tackling anti-social behaviour and dealing with cases involving vulnerable individuals with serious mental health issues. BLM is also well versed in advising on and taking action in housing fraud cases, in whatever guise the fraud arises.

Key contact:
Matthew Hyam, partner
matthew.hyam@blmlaw.com
+44 (0)151 471 5459

News From The Sector

In July 2020, the Chancellor announced £2 billion of support through the Green Homes Grant to cut carbon emissions and create green jobs in the UK. The grant will be comprised of up to £1.5 billion of support through energy efficiency vouchers and up to £500m of support allocated to Local Authorities.

The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) is inviting LAs, working with their local partners, to apply for funding to be used to improve the energy efficiency of low-income households living in their area. LAs are asked to come forward with previously developed proposals or new proposals that meet the desired outcomes of the scheme. The LAD scheme aims to raise the energy efficiency of low-income and low EPC rated homes, including those living in the worst quality off-gas grid homes, delivering progress towards reducing fuel poverty, the phasing out of the installation of high carbon fossil fuel heating and the UK's commitment to carbon net zero by 2050.

READ THE FULL REPORT

This is a great opportunity for Las’ to invest in replacement gas boilers to help tackle fuel poverty and inefficient heating systems. CHIC offers an OJEU compliant solution for labour and materials to support this through our Planned Works and Merchants Framework.

If you didn’t get the chance to meet the 1^st September application date, there are plans to invite phase two submissions soon.

If you have any related questions, please feel free to get in touch at enquiries@chicltd.co.uk

In Other News

Major Steps in Wales

There have already been major developments by the Welsh Government in reducing the carbon footprint of the housing sector, now being driven even further with the latest retrofit programme. The announced £9.5 million programme plans to cut energy bills and tackle fuel poverty. Optimised Retrofit Programmes (ORP) funding will support the fitting of energy efficiency measures in up to 1,000 existing homes owned by social landlords and councils. It forms part of a £45 million Innovative Housing Programme announced earlier this year, which focuses on building new carbon-neutral homes using modern methods of construction.

Wales has also taken a huge step in tackling homelessness. During the peak of the pandemic, homeless people in Wales were housed in temporary accommodation. Since then, charities, local authorities and the Welsh Government have been working to find them more permanent homes. £50m in total has been made available to support projects across Wales, which help provide those in need with safe and secure homes.

Covid-19 Disruption

Has the pandemic caused more disruption than initially estimated to the construction and house building sector? Many housing associations across the UK have reported significant decreases in the number of new completions with restrictions affecting their development pipelines, some seeing decreases of up to 70% in the first quarter of 2020 compared to the same period last year. It has recently been revealed that housing construction output has also seen reductions to less than half compared to 2019, despite the record surge in June.

Depending on the status of the pandemic, we are expecting 2021 to see major development and asset management projects being fully underway to offset the delays this year, which CHIC is fully prepared to support. If you need us to help prepare new contracts, please get in touch.

News from the Supply Chain

Travis Perkins Repair, Maintenance and Improvement Survey

Travis Perkins, the UK’s largest distributor of materials and equipment to the building, construction and home improvement markets have a unique insight into how the country’s tradespeople operate. Their report captures the views of over 1,300 tradespeople from all areas of the country in order to understand their views on future workloads, areas of the market driving their business and issues such as Brexit, as they look ahead to the next two months. The survey reported some interesting statistics, such as 91% expect workloads to remain unchanged or grow in the next two months and almost 3/4 identify domestic repairs and improvements as key growth driver.

Read the full report

SGS to host a series of beneficial webinars

SGS will host a series of complimentary webinars focusing on the benefits that ISO standards can bring to your organisation and the pitfalls organisations can come across when implementing the standards and how to avoid them. This series of webinars will cover ISO 50001 and the environment, ISO 45001 and mental health and wellbeing and ISO/IEC 27001 and information security. The first webinar will be commencing on 22nd September 2020 at 14:00pm.

Find out more

PH Jones making steps to go green

PH Jones is taking delivery of 50 new electric vans which generate zero emissions, benefiting the environment by reducing harmful air and noise pollution, whilst positively impacting health. They are retiring their fleet of diesel engine-powered vehicles, in line with their fleet’s commitment to the EV100 initiative, which strives towards zero emissions by 2030.
The new electric vans are 85-90% more efficient than the old standard diesel-powered vans, which is a major step forward in making the journey towards a carbon-free future and reducing their energy consumption.

All of these organisations are accessible through CHIC’s contracts and frameworks. To find out more, please contact enquiries@chicltd.co.uk

CHIC Webinars

Our first in a series of CHIC webinars is right around the corner and there are limited spaces available.

On Thursday 17^th September, we will be hosting our Compliance and Building Safety Webinar, providing knowledge on what best practice really looks like in today’s housing market to ensure residents have safe homes to live in.

The agenda will be delivered by 3 housing professionals with extensive knowledge on the subject:

Mark Pinnell

Executive Director of Assets and Development - Solihull Community Housing

Wayne Williams

Managing Director - DMW Environmental Safety

Mark Johnson

Consultant – ARK Consultancy

Our webinars are free to attend for all of our members and supply chain partners.

Click Here to register your place or Here to view our full schedule.

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