Mears holds Hertfordshire housing scheme

Mears has held on to a massive housing maintenance deal in Hertfordshire, despite the efforts of five heavyweight rivals to snatch it away.

The prize is Welwyn Hatfield Borough Council's housing maintenance programme and, at up to £245m, is Mears' biggest-ever contract win.

The news signals the end of the road for the other contenders - Connaught, Inspace, Morrison, Rok and Serco.

Unusually for schemes of this size, the council has gone for only one contractor to carry out its entire programme of work. This means the project will now provide Mears with 15 years of work under a partnering agreement and bring in at least £151m and possibly up to £245m into the company's coffers.

An insider said: "The selection criteria was based 100% on quality. But, of course, contractors had to present a business case within budget as well.

"Also, Mears is a known quantity to the council because it's already carrying out Welwyn Hatfield's planned housing maintenance."

The new scheme combines both planned and responsive maintenance - previously, the latter job was carried out by the council's in-house team.

But now Mears will carry out maintenance tasks on the council's entire stock of 9,580 tenanted homes and 1,500 leasehold properties.

Work on site is expected to kick off at the beginning of October this year.

The planned maintenance side of the deal will cover all repairs and upgrades apart from gas works, while on the responsive side Mears will have to be on call 24 hours a day, 365 days of the year to deal with urgent tasks.