Mears wins £72 million contract to maintain West Leeds council properties

A £72 million contract to maintain local authority properties has been awarded to existing contractor Mears Limited.

Leeds City Council has decided to bring more housing maintenance work back in house – but has appointed a contractor to look after almost 19,000 properties on the western side of the city. The contract will last for five years and has the annual value of £14.35m.

A council report published this week said four compliant submissions were received and evaluated by the officers on the tender evaluation panel with support from specialist guest scorers.

The report says appointing Mears will allow people to live in safe, accessible and well maintained homes. The contractor would deal with responsive repairs, voids and cyclical maintenance from 1 October 2021. The report added:

“Failure to award this contract, may result in properties falling into disrepair where delays are incurred in undertaking repairs works due to having no contract in place to compliantly do so.

“Following completion of a compliant and robust procurement exercise, and owing to the statutory nature of the works, it is agreed by the Project Board that the approach to award this contract to the Most Economically Advantageous Tenderer is the correct approach to take.”

Previous housing maintenance arrangements in Leeds, which expire this year, involved in-house service provider Leeds Building Services (LBS) delivering in the east and Mears looking after the south and west.

Under this new arrangement the geographic arrangements remain much the same but LBS is being given the south region as well as the east, with just the one contract opened up to the private sector.

The contact covers properties in the Adel and Wharfedale; Armley; Bramley and Stanningley; Calverley and Farsley; Farnley and Wortley; Guiseley and Rawdon; Headingley and Hyde Park; Horsforth; Kirkstall; Little London and Woodhouse; Otley and Yeadon; Pudsey and Weetwood wards.