8 INDUSTRY NEWS
£150m loan agreed for first Housing Delivery Fund Homes
Peterborough housing debated at Larkfleet Conference
The conference, held at the Great Northern Hotel in Peterborough on 13 June, was organised by the Bourne-based Larkfleet Group of Companies, which includes developers Larkfleet Homes and Allison Homes.
NHBC names UK’s best site managers
Homes England and Barclays have agreed £155.3m of loan funding to accelerate the construction of new homes in Wimbledon and Southampton. Announced by Housing Minister Kit Malthouse during the CIH Housing Conference in Manchester, the deals are the first to be agreed from the £1bn Housing Delivery Fund announced last year. In Wimbledon, a total of £150m will be loaned to Merton Catalyst LLP, a JV between housing association Catalyst and developer Galliard. The funding will be used to help bring forward 604 apartments on the hybrid residential-led scheme at the former Wimbledon Greyhound Stadium site in Plough Lane, with the development also involving commercial space, improvements to the public realm and a new sports stadium delivered by AFC Wimbledon. In Southampton, Cannon Capital
Developments will receive a £5.3m loan to convert a former commercial building into 56 apartments for private sale in the city’s Ogle Road. “We recognised the need to get financing to smaller and medium-sized developers to help increase the number of quality homes being constructed,” said Dennis Watson, head of Real Estate at Barclays Corporate Banking. “That’s why we set up the Housing Delivery Fund with Homes England – to ensure projects like this could become a reality. Hundreds of homes, including affordable housing, are now on their way, but we know there is still more to do.”
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Around 100 local political and business leaders met to discuss housing and economic development in the region surrounding Peterborough at this year’s Larkfleet Conference. This year’s annual event focused on plans
for the ‘Oxford-Cambridge Arc,’ a Government development plan. It could include one million new homes by 2050, as well as the supporting transport, communications and economic infrastructure necessary to enable this. The event was chaired by Lord Taylor of Goss Moor, and the speakers included Larkfleet CEO Karl Hick, head of strategic growth for Homes England Sarah Greenwood, and Mayor of the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority James Palmer. The chair told the conference: “We should not be developing new homes that do not meet future standards. The houses we build now will still be around in 50, 100 or more years.” Sarah Greenwood stressed that the Cambridge-Oxford Arc was not just an opportunity to build homes but an opportunity to integrate housing and economic development: “This is an area of enormous economic potential, but we need the right kind of houses in the right places or the economy will decline.” “If people cannot afford to live here, they will go elsewhere,” she continued. “This is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to shape the future.” Mayor James Palmer indicated the need
for investment in skills as well as housing and jobs. He said that garden villages, creating sustainable new communities, would be the key to delivering the ambitions for the Cambridge-Oxford Arc.
Nearly 450 UK site managers have won a Quality Award in the first round of the National House Building Council’s (NHBC) Pride in the Job Awards 2019, representing the top 3 per cent of the 16,000 site managers entered. Each site manager was assessed across these six key areas: consistency, attention to detail, leadership, interpretation of drawings and specifications, technical expertise, and health and safety. The Quality Award winners will now go on to compete for Seal of Excellence and Regional Awards that will be announced at events across the UK in the autumn, with the Supreme Award winners unveiled at a gala ceremony in January 2020. Commenting on the awards, NHBC chief executive Steve Wood said: “Launched nearly 40 years ago, Pride in the Job has been instrumental in driving up the quality of new homes. Despite the challenges the industry has faced in recent times, this year’s winners have kept their focus on delivering high quality new homes for their customers. “A site manager’s role is undoubtedly one of the toughest in housebuilding, and their drive for excellence is very much at the heart of the competition. Receiving a Quality Award is a great achievement for any site manager. It’s no surprise that Pride in the Job winning sites have higher levels of customer satisfaction as these homes are without doubt among the best the UK has to offer.”
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