A day in the life of Pauline Steele

We dropped in on resident liaison officer Pauline Steele to find out how the works were progressing as they near completion. "We're handing over dozens of properties each week as we get closer to the contract finish date in April" said Pauline "and things have got a lot easier now the sun's come out. I've also been spending time getting the next project at Malm St ready, making sure that we have all the owners signed up so that works can progress as smoothly as possible". This is Pauline's first project with Hobson & Porter, but has many years experience of resident liaison with Connaught on Decent Homes projects. Before we left we dropped in on local resident Brian Toole at De La Pole Avenue.

A busy day as we near completion

A really busy day for site clerk Pete Wilson and the rest of the team as we hand over dozens of properties at Glasgow St, Somerset St and Woodcock St. Apart from some minor last minute glitches - some of the doors arrived hung the wrong way! - the works have gone like a dream, and we are confident of completing the works next month.

Towards Zero Defects

A productive visit to site earlier this week. As part of our role as a Think Zero Champion we are exploring ways to help the various trades work more effectively together to minimise snags during the works, which means less time spent on each property and less disruption to occupants. Keeping the same key trades together has definitely had measurable benefits. Speaking to the client's clerk of works he has just finished inspecting 25 houses at Glasgow St and found only 3 very minor snags. He also commented that the residents were more responsive to locally based contractors and subcontractors. As part of our commitment to local labour we attended an event last week at the Guildhall where we collected a certificate from Home Secretary Alan Johnson for our work in providing employment and training opportunities on Gateway projects. Buying local makes sense when regenerating communities, as the money is re-spent locally, and it also means less carbon emissions because materials and labour have less distance to travel to site.