Building better partnerships to build better homes

This blog is our summary and key takeaways from  Session 3 from the New Homes in New Ways Summit, hosted by Saint-Gobain Off-Site Solutions. Watch the Summit on our YouTube channel.

How can partnerships between stakeholders boost housing delivery in the UK?

This panel was chaired by Nicola Mathers, CEO of Future of London, and included Jake Snell, Head of Asset Innovation at Abri Group, Nigel Ostime, Consultant at Hawkins\Brown, Tom Cox, Director of Construction Solutions, Saint-Gobain UK and Ireland, and Trudi Sully, UK & Europe Lead for industrialised design and construction, Mott Macdonald.

Nicola opened the conversation by reiterating a recurring theme at the summit – the urgency of the housing and Temporary Accommodation crises in the UK. As such, she stressed that we need to come together through collaboration and partnerships. Trudi, whose career has been focused on enabling and facilitating good partnerships, echoed this, saying “to successfully move forward, and transform any industrial environment, requires people to work together to overcome challenges.” Using the example of the Construction Innovation Hub (CIH), which has over 600 industry partners working on it, Trudi commented that overcoming the initial lack of trust was one of the CIH’s greatest achievements. She added that people must develop confidence and trust that working together is of mutual benefit for partnerships to be effective.

Jake said that there is an increasing need for partnerships in the context of building homes in new ways (MMC), but that operationally this can be complicated. He mentioned Building Better as a helpful membership body in helping Housing Associations and others to understand MMC systems, procurement, contracts etc. He added that Housing Associations can be risk averse, and partnerships like this can help to de-risk the process for them.

Standardisation and pattern books

Much of the conversation was dedicated to how standardisation and pattern books could make partnerships easier in the sector. Nigel said that standardisation is an enabler of partnerships but cautioned against being too prescriptive. He recommended a high-level platform approach that designers can gather around to make the design process more productive at the outset of a project. He further recommended standardising category 5 components such as bathroom pods and utility cupboards, but for the most part keeping standardisation light touch.

Jake said that product standardisation would help Housing Associations gain confidence, because it would de-risk against failure of a particular manufacturer.

The panel agreed that standardisation is necessary, but must be balanced with flexibility as needed. Trudi added that process is as important as product in this regard, suggesting we also ask the question: “Where can high volumes of key assets can be delivered in more standardised ways?”

Offering a supplier perspective, Tom added that manufacturing can’t be scaled without standardisation. He gave an example of a project where Saint Gobain worked with a Housing Association to adapt their existing standard house types for MMC and can now be manufactured to the scale of 4000 build units a year. He added that even with standard house types there is plenty of flexibility with design and finish, but because the chassis and panel is standardised, efficient and cost-effective manufacturing is possible.

An inspiring example: The Welsh Pattern Book

The Welsh pattern book, sponsored by the Welsh Government, was a collaboration between 23 housing associations and social landlords, who went through a process of agreeing what they wanted to deliver, and then worked with local architects and supply chains to develop a pattern book to deliver 18 different house types across Wales efficiently and affordably. Panellists cited this as a great example of partnership working to boost housing delivery.

In summary, this was a fascinating conversation where all panellists agreed that partnerships are crucial to meeting our housing targets, and further collective conversations will support this.