AdvantageSW (ASW) a partnership of Southwest housing associations has been awarded a Gold Award for Excellence by the Housing Corporation for its innovative approach to tackling the region’s affordable housing crisis.

The Ocean Housing Group, South Somerset Homes, North Devon Homes and Devon & Cornwall Housing teamed up two years ago to design, use and market a range of factory built timber frame homes that can be built in half the time it takes using traditional construction methods.

The partners also joined forces with two Westcountry manufacturers Frame Homes from Redruth and Callington based Advanced Panel Systems who can jointly supply up to 3000 houses a year.

 
 


Based on the Beacon Council Scheme which has delivered improvement in local government for over six years, the Gold Award has been set up by the Housing Corporation to drive up standards and performance and highlight better and novel ways of working across the social housing sector.

To win the Gold Award for Innovation in Procurement, ASW had to demonstrate to a judging panel of leading housing experts how it has used innovation in its development work through a leading edge approach to procurement of both physical works and building materials.

David Renwick, chief executive of the Ocean Group, chairs ASW. He said: The Government need to provide for 3 million additional homes by 2016, and it has said that to achieve this target, housing providers will need to use modern methods of design and construction. This will mean much faster build times, encourage the use of sustainable materials and offer reductions in energy use and waste. To drive this home they have specified that at least a quarter of all new publicly funded social housing must be built in this way.

“As providers of new affordable homes we rely heavily on funding from the Housing Corporation and have to meet their 25 per cent modern methods of construction target. The choice each of the partners in ASW faced was whether to go it alone in terms of designing and procuring homes built in this way or to form a consortium. Through the Partnership we have access to a wide range of approved house type designs, which saves us time and money at the planning stage of every new scheme. More importantly because of our combined buying power we have a secure and local supply network involving two of the most experienced manufacturers in the country”.

Mr Renwick went on to say that other providers of affordable homes can share these benefits: “We’ve done all the hard work in terms of designing and obtaining accreditation for the house types and through our manufacturers we can guarantee supply, so for a nominal facility fee per house we can offer other housing associations a truly off-the-shelf portfolio of products”.

The Gold Award carries with it a prize of £50,000, which ASW will use to fund a year long accessible information programme to share their knowledge and experience with housing associations across the country.

Sir Duncan Michael, Chair of the judging panel said: “The competition is about recognising excellence in housing provision and sharing cutting-edge knowledge with the housing sector. It is intended to raise the quality of housing provision for millions of residents across the country”