CHIC’s Board and staff team met for our annual business strategy ‘awayday’ at the end of May, in advance of the new financial year, which for CHIC starts on 1^st July.

This year our objective was to reset the focus of CHIC for the next 5 years and work this up into a new business plan. CHIC’s current 5 year business plan period is to complete shortly, so we wanted to look at what we do and how we can continue to add value to Members over the next 5 years (2021-2026).

With the current coronavirus restrictions, the awayday was held virtually for the first time and worked very effectively. It allowed for really focussed discussions within a range of workshop groups.

In all we had eight workshop groups which were assigned a specific topic that the CHIC Board and team agreed needed to be reviewed, to ensure that CHIC remains focused on delivering great value for all of our members.

CHIC’s Board member perspective remains key to ensuring that CHIC delivers a range of services and products that reflect member needs and expectation.

Some of the headlines for the workshops for the new business plan are set out below:

Members Agreement | CHIC discussed how we can develop a more focused, streamlined Members Agreement to make it easier for new members to join and for the Board to manage the business on behalf of members

Operating Systems | CHIC discussed how we will ensure that our operating systems can be developed to support the expected growth over the next 5 years

Services & Products | Alongside the continual expansion of our products, CHIC considered how our current service structure can be improved to better promote what we offer and to help Members find what they want

Social Value | CHIC considered what our offer should look like going forward and how we might do more to deliver added value

Business Plan Priorities | We reviewed key objectives and targets to focus the business strategy to 2026

Marketing Strategy & Resources | CHIC considered how our current communications and marketing strategy should adapt to changing requirements

Zero Carbon | The growing requirement for an effective decarbonisation offer was reviewed in the context of our wider service offer

Having now agreed the key objectives to be addressed over the next 5 years, the Board will review a more detailed Business Strategy at the September meeting.

This will add strength to some significant changes over the past few months. This includes changing the full name of CHIC to Communities and Housing Investment Consortium, the implementation of our Dynamic Purchasing System and the development of our CHIC Ordering Management System (COMS).

CHIC Operational Team

There have also been some changes in CHIC’s operational team. Last month, we said goodbye to Marius Marisca (Procurement Manager) and Joseph Scurr (Supply Chain Manager). Both had been with CHIC for 6 years, during a time of significant growth. We wish them well in their new roles.

We are also pleased to be welcoming Manjit Sanghera who started with CHIC in June. As our new Supply Chain Manager, her role will entail managing CHIC’s relationship with the supply chain to support all programmes being delivered through CHIC’s frameworks, contracts and DPS.

Recruiting Now

We currently have two vacancies in the CHIC team where we are currently inviting applications for:

• Procurement Manager
• Head of Member Services (North)

If you know anyone who might be interested, please contact lhurd@chicltd.co.uk

We are also seeking a couple of new Board members.

CHIC’s governance is overseen by a Board of Directors whose role it is to set the consortiums strategic direction and oversee delivery of the strategy. The Board has an independent Chair and up to two independent Members, but most directors are representative of CHIC’s Members.

We have just had to say goodbye to Andy Howarth, former co-optee and founding chair of CHIC. Andy has been with CHIC since it’s inception and has played a crucial part in the evolution and success of CHIC.

We will also say goodbye to Ian Hancock, who’s last board meeting will take place in September. As our current Vice Chair, Ian has contributed significantly to the strategic direction of CHIC over the past 7 years.

David Wells, Head of Operational Services at Wrekin Housing Trust, will begin his first term as Vice Chair following Ian’s departure. David has been a board member of CHIC for 5 years and his knowledge and expertise adds real strength to CHIC’s governance.

The Board and staff at CHIC thank Ian and Andy for their continued commitment to CHIC and we wish them all the best in the future and continuing as CHIC Members!

Board Vacancies

CHIC is now recruiting for two additions to the Board of Directors. We are seeking one member representative and one member or independent representative, ideally with commercial and development knowledge and expertise. If you would like to discuss the opportunities, please contact John Fisher in the first instance jfisher@chicltd.co.uk.

Market Price Movements

CHIC has, and will continue, to work collaboratively with the materials supply chain to better understand the potential supply related issues that may arise due to Brexit, as well as the knock-on effect of Covid 19. This close partnership has allowed CHIC to maintain an understanding as to how the supply of materials has been affected in the short term as well as the commercial and operational impact this will have on our members.

Due to the ever changing environment that has been presented by Covid-19, coupled with the unknown future instability of not only the UK markets, but also Europe and the Far East, the effect to the supply of materials has been and will continue to be sporadic and unpredictable. That said, the distributors and suppliers within the supply chain find themselves acting both reactively and proactively to limit the impact to the sector where possible.

As a result of the instability witnessed in the last 12 months, certain commodities and materials have created supply challenges. The cost of importing a container to the UK has jumped from c. £2,000 per container to c. £12,000 per container, a 600% increase. This has resulted in price fluctuations and increased lead in times. This is now resulting in significant increases in the cost of both material components and the manufacture of category 1 goods. These costs are now having to be passed onto to members via price increases.

CHIC has seen applications for price increases across a multitude of product categories including:

• Roofing materials – longer lead times and average 9% increase in cost
• Radiators – average c38% increase in costs
• Timber – longer lead times and increased costs
• Kitchen Manufacture – ranging between a 20% and 56% increase in costs
• Windows and Doors – ranging between a 6% and 13% increase in costs
• Boilers – longer lead times and increased costs on some ranges
• Imported electrical components – longer lead times

If you have any queries or concerns regarding market price movements, please get in touch with one of our member services representatives, detailed below:

Stephen Sharman
Head of Member Services (Midlands & South East)
ssharman@chicltd.co.uk

Victoria Speakman
Head of Member Services (South West & Wales)
vspeakman@chicltd.co.uk

Lesley Dixon
Head of Member Services (Cumbria & North West)
ldixon@chicltd.co.uk

Regulator of Social Housing Updates

There have been some interesting finds reported by RSH over the past month…

Corporate plan 2021-2024

The Corporate plan published by the Regulator of Social Housing outlines how they plan on delivering their purpose over the next three years, reviewing the plan annually to ensure it takes account of any relevant significant changes in the external operating environment.

RSH state “There will be significant change over the period, for example, as a result of changes in government policy, arising from the Charter for social housing residents: Social Housing White Paper, and the response to the Grenfell Tower Public Inquiry, which all inform the further development of our role and our priorities over the coming years.”

The plan outlines many key fundamental and strategic objectives, including implementing reforms outlined in the Social Housing White Paper and increasing the supply of housing and affordable housing, ensuring that existing homes are safe and of a decent standard.

Read the full report 

Social Housing Sector – Finances in Good Health

The Regulator of Social Housing has also published the results of its latest quarterly survey of registered providers’ financial health, covering the period from 1 January 2021 to 31 March 2021.

It is great to be reporting that the sector has remained financially healthy over the last financial year, despite the pressures caused by the pandemic. This included £15 billion of new finance agreed in the year, the highest sum ever recorded.

Capitalised repairs and maintenance spending increased substantially for the second quarter in a row to £580 million. Despite the ongoing delays due to lockdown restrictions, outturn spend has been recovering towards levels seen before the start of the coronavirus pandemic.

Read the full report 

Reinvestment in social housing is at highest level

English housing associations’ reinvestment in existing and new social housing is at its highest ever level, according to the RSH Value for Money report, despite a decline in overall operating surplus.

The publication which recorded results ending 31 March 2020 found that reinvestment (as a proportion of asset values) increased 15.7 per cent at the median level, reaching 7.2 per cent.

Read the full report 

Travis Perkins says the price of bagged cement will rise by 15%, chipboard by 10% and paint by 5% from Tuesday as industry groups warn electrical components, timber and steel are in short supply. This is due to increased demand following the lockdown easing with consumers doing more DIY projects, shipping costs and other supply chain challenges.

The Office for National Statistics has projected a rise of 7-8% in material prices this year, with increases for certain materials, such as timber, expected to more than double.

Read More 

CHIC’s Head of Merchant Services Giles Newman says “We are actively working with the CHIC supply chain to further understand the current and wider implications of the increased demand / price increases and how this will affect CHIC members”

If you would like to find out how these price increases will affect your programmes, please get in touch with your Head of Member Services:

Stephen Sharman
Head of Member Services (Midlands & South East)
ssharman@chicltd.co.uk

Victoria Speakman
Head of Member Services (South West & Wales)
vspeakman@chicltd.co.uk

Lesley Dixon
Head of Member Services (Cumbria & North West)
ldixon@chicltd.co.uk

Meridian Business Support

Established in 1989, Meridian Business Support is an award-winning recruitment company, operating in multiple specialist markets throughout the UK. One of the leading independently owned agencies in the UK, we specialise in temporary, permanent and contract recruitment across four key sectors, Built Environment, Health, Office & Professional and Industrial.

All our clients receive a tailor-made service, delivered by expert recruiters with unparalleled industry knowledge and clear sector understanding.

Temporary Recruitment

We supply temporary and contract workers to clients in a variety of sectors throughout the UK, our industry-leading recruitment consultants ensure that temporary and contract workers support our clients’ businesses, whenever and wherever they are needed, whether it is an ad-hoc booking or a long-term assignment.

Permanent Bookings

We understand that having just one key person missing from a team can affect efficiency and profitability. We manage the end-to-end recruitment process for our clients, allowing them to focus on other areas of their business.

Our industry accredited and professionally trained Permanent Consultants work with our clients to ensure we fully understand their brief in terms of job description, person specification and organisational culture.

We also offer an Executive Search service; our Search Consultants are experts in finding the people our clients are looking for. These individuals are identified and carefully recruited, as they often have no plans to change employer.

Award Winning

People are at the very heart of what we do and we are really proud to have been awarded a best Companies 2 Star accolade for 2 years running. Other awards we have collected over the recent years are Recruitment Campaign of the Year at the IRP Awards, Best Perm Recruiter at the Global Recruiter Awards, Best Company to Work For (£100m+) at the Recruitment International awards and Best Healthcare Recruitment Company to Work For at the Investing in Talent awards.

Inclusive

Meridian is committed to creating opportunities for all and in 2019 we became a Disability Confident Employer. In 2020 we partnered with Leonard Cheshire, a leading disability charity and through this partnership we employ Change 100 Interns. Change 100 is an initiative that aims to unlock the untapped potential of students and graduates with disabilities and give organisations access to a talent pool full of ability, creativity and insight.

We also participate in various other programmes with the charity and our CEO has presented to school leavers and college age young adults to help develop their confidence and skills.

We hope through this partnership we can increase disability awareness not just within our own business but across our clients and the recruitment industry too.

For more information about how meridian can help you please contact:

Jacqueline Vasey

Head of Client Services for Public Sector and Housing

JVasey@meridianbs.co.uk

t.  07507 649175 | w. www.meridianbs.co.uk |

Last week, CHIC hosted our CHIC Webinar Day. This replaced our annual conference, usually held at Worcester Warriors. This years conference is now to be held on Wednesday 17^th November. As this is an annual event for many, we decided to hold three webinars instead.

We invited a range of housing and construction professionals to provide their expertise on three topical issues facing the social housing sector. Many thanks to all that attended, our speakers and Mark Easton for hosting.

All three webinars were well attended and very well received. Our speakers delivered excellent perspectives and information on three important topics the sector is currently addressing. This is a short summary of each event below, along with links to revisit the presentations.

Asset Management – Now is Time for Action

This webinar took a deep dive into the profile of asset managers and what is expected of social landlords to maintain people and building safety. The webinar considered the implications of the Social Housing White Paper. Our speakers discussed it’s priorities, how to know your landlord is performing well and the reasoning behind why the decent homes standard is under review, alongside the implementation process taken by the Regulator of Social Housing. Other talking points were presented such as the importance of having an effective strategic plan when maintaining properties, the need for using data intelligently and the current section position and lessons learned since the Grenfell tragedy.   

Many thanks to our speakers John Fisher, Chief Executive at CHIC, Lucy Hutton, Head of Social Housing Safety, Decency and Climate Change at MHCLG and Rob Collier, Senior Consultant at ARK Consultancy.

Download the Presentation Slides

Procurement Post Brexit – What’s Changing?

Brexit has happened, however with recent events, more urgent requirements from the UK Government stole the headlines. This session brought the conversation back and looked at what procurement will look like in the coming months and years and what effect this will have on supply chains. A primary focus was on the recent Government Green Paper - Transforming Public Procurement. Our speakers took an in depth look from a variety of perspectives into the new procurement principles, why there is still a need for greater clarification for social landlords, the imminent challenges in the supply of raw materials and the top 5 takeaway points you should be aware of.

Many thanks to our speakers Jayne Bissell, Group Procurement Manager at Connexus, Mark Robinson, Partner at Trowers & Hamlins, Martin Bull, Procurement Director at BuildBase and Sam Domican, Head of Procurement at CHIC.

Download the Presentation Slides

Zero Carbon – So What Does It Really Mean?

One of the most highly debated topics within the sector is how we are going to meet the Government ambitious decarbonisation targets. Many social landlords did not understand the challenge until recently, but it is now in every proactive registered provider’s plans for the next three decades. The sector has responded both quickly and positively to embracing this challenge. Our speakers discussed whether we really understand what the full implications are, what tools we can utilise to make the transition easier, the true explanation of what net zero carbon and low carbon is and the great progress that some housing associations, particularly in Wales have already made.

Many thanks to our speakers Andy Sutton, Director of Design & Innovation at Sero, Emma Harvey, Programme Director at Green Finance Institute, Sarah Davey, Head of Development at CHIC and Sarah Scofield, Director of Customers and Communities at ADRA.

Download the Presentation Slides

To view a recording of the above webinars, please visit our website at https://www.chicltd.co.uk/chic-webinar-day-round-up