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NIHE collapses tenders ‘worth £1bn’ after legal challenge
Northern Ireland’s state-owned social landlord has abandoned tenders for two major procurement frameworks reportedly worth more than £1bn.
The Northern Ireland Housing Executive (NIHE), which owns more than 85,000 homes across the region, took the step after unsuccessful bidders issued legal challenges over the tender processes.
Trade bodies the Construction Employers Federation (CEF) and the Federation of Master Builders (FMB) said the scrapped contracts represented more than £1bn of investment in NIHE stock, and warned the tender collapse could put hundreds of jobs at risk and cause “drastic curtailing” of maintenance in homes across Northern Ireland.
The contracts were for the NIHE’s maintenance programmes including the installation of bathrooms and kitchens in its homes, rewiring and fitting new doors and windows.
They were expected to start in April, with preferred bidders chosen after an evaluation process in May last year.
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A spokesperson for the NIHE said: “In the public interest, and because of the risk in costs of ongoing litigation, we decided that it would be more expedient to collapse those particular procurement exercises and instead consider alternative approaches.
“We were especially concerned that if we became involved in a protracted legal process, there would be unnecessary delay to work to our tenants’ homes as well as a detrimental impact on releasing work to the local construction industry.
“We are extremely disappointed that we are unable to proceed with these contracts as intended and as a consequence there will now be some delays in starting a number of improvement schemes.”
The landlord added it will be contacting affected tenants and will put smaller contracts in place on an interim basis to “mitigate against the current impasse” while it considers how to arrange longer contracts.
“These procurement collapses call into question the deliverability of planned maintenance across the Housing Executive’s estate over the coming six months, at least, meaning there could be a drastic curtailing of the maintenance required to people’s homes all over Northern Ireland,” the CEF and FMB said in a joint statement.
“At a time when the Housing Executive is faced with a major shortfall in their available budget against their actual maintenance need, this is a situation that no one can afford – indeed it is a situation that we believe could and should have been avoided if procurement issues that had arisen had been dealt with in a pro-active and timely manner.”
In October, it emerged that up to half of the NIHE’s huge stock could be left to fall into disrepair if it is not able to secure extra funding.
Inside Housing revealed today that the NIHE has commissioned an independent report on outsourcing of repairs and maintenance contracts, having been severely hit by the collapse of Carillion last year.
