London Borough of Tower Hamlets
As well as delivering construction services ranging from feasibility to post-contract management, we’ve delivered years of employment, education and skills programmes for communities in the Borough. Tower Hamlets has an unemployment rate of 13% among 16-74 year olds compared to a national average of 5%, we’ve played a role in helping to improve.
Our dedicated Corporate Social Responsibility Officer has worked with Tower Hamlets’ officers to organise a range of activities including:
- Visiting schools to give CV writing and interview advice.
- Holding mock interviews with sixth form students to help them achieve places in their preferred universities or with preferred employers.
- Providing work experience placements in our offices for 18 students.
- Helping set up a homework club for underprivileged children.
- Working with framework contractors to provide apprenticeships for 33 people, from trainee quantity surveyors to administrative staff.
Our largest delivery programme is the £50m Decent Homes programme, where our scope was increased both in services (to include structural strengthening works to a block outside the programme) and value (to take over works from a poor performing consultant). We were consistently rated #1 consultant across the programme according to the client’s monthly KPIs.
When Tower Hamlets Homes wanted to regenerate an estate, our asset management team conducted a feasibility study and issued a report detailing nine options for meeting the client’s goals: increasing the number of units on the estate as well as its general environment and appeal.
Stakeholder management is always crucial but especially so in one of our projects for Tower Hamlets, where residents were dissatisfied as works had previously been programmed for completion at an earlier phase, before our involvement. There were a number of stakeolders to manage, including:
- The Lister and Treves Tenant and Resident Association (TRA)
- British Gas in order to obtain CESP funding
- LB Tower Hamlets planning department
- Police due to high incidences of anti-social behavior around the block
The site was situated on the Olympic route for the marathon and the policy was not to have any scaffolding on buildings along the route. Therefore the timing and sequencing of the works had to be communicated to the relevant department within the local authority, and programme delays had to be stringently avoided. All works were completed on time to residents’ satisfaction.