This meeting included a range of topics. The most significant were the adoption of a new sustainable procurement strategy, approval of funding for 137 community projects from the Neighbourhood Community Infrastructure Levy, and consideration of the Housing Retrofit Strategy. The meeting also included requests for extensions to several supported housing contracts and an extension to the out of hours switchboard contract.

It is important to note that this article is based only on the documents that were provided to attendees of the meeting, and so it does not describe what was actually discussed or decided.

Sustainable Procurement Strategy 2025 - 2029

The report pack included a new Sustainable Procurement Strategy ¹ that was scheduled to be considered for adoption by the Mayor and Cabinet. The strategy sets out the Council's ambitions for procurement over the next 4 years and highlights a range of benefits to the local community that can be achieved through a focus on sustainable procurement. The strategy highlights the significance of the Council’s procurement budget.

“In 2024, Lewisham Council's gross revenue expenditure budget was over £1.4 billion, with around £500 million allocated to contracts for works, services, and supplies, meaning that the impact of its procurement is significant.”

The report pack notes that the Sustainable Procurement Strategy is aligned to the following Corporate Priorities from Lewisham’s Corporate Strategy:

• Cleaner and Greener • A Strong Local Economy • Quality Housing • Children and Young People • Safer Communities • Open Lewisham • Health and Wellbeing

The report pack lists 5 key themes that underpin the strategy. These are:

1. The Future of Procurement
2. Organisational Approach to Contract Management
3. Cost of Living Pressures
4. Ethical Supply Chain Management
5. Tackling the Climate Emergency

The new Public Procurement Act 2023 ², which came into force on 24 February 2025 is referenced in the report pack as a driver for some of the changes that are being proposed in the Strategy.

The foreword to the Sustainable Procurement Strategy 2025 - 2029 was written by Councillor Amanda De Ryk, the Cabinet Member for Finance, Resources and Performance. The foreword makes a direct reference to the ‘Buy British’ bill, which received its second reading in the House of Commons in 2024, and in particular the benefits that come from measuring and monitoring the Council’s spend.

“When we measure, track and monitor where money is spent then we have a chance at understanding the wider impact of every public pound. If we are clever, we can make every purchase do double-duty.”

Councillor De Ryk also notes in the foreword that in a recent survey Lewisham was ranked as the best local authority in the UK for keeping spend local.

“In a 2023 survey by Tussel and LocalGov on regional spend, Lewisham Borough Council came top in the Local Government Procurement Index for the whole of the UK. Our spend within Lewisham and the wider London region was 83% of our £300m total.”

The report pack included a list of 17 deliverables across the 5 themes. It stated that the strategy may be revised to take account of any change in the Council’s corporate priorities and funding changes that may come into effect from 2026/27.

Neighbourhood Community Infrastructure Levy (NCIL)

The report pack included details on the Council's Neighbourhood Community Infrastructure Levy (NCIL) funding programme ³ for 2025-2027, and listed projects that had been recommended for funding.

The report pack explained what NCIL funding is, how it is collected and how it can be used:

“The Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL) is a levy that local authorities can choose to charge on ‘chargeable’ new development in their area. The Levy is collected and monitored in Lewisham by the Council’s planning department. An element of these funds is to be spent at a local level and is known as Neighbourhood CIL (NCIL).”

The report pack explained how this levy is defined by law:

“NCIL is defined through R59F of the CIL Regulations (2010) which enables the Council to allocate a portion of CIL receipts to be spent on local priorities, with spending of this portion subject to a wider definition of “The charging authority may use the CIL to which this regulation applies, or cause it to be used, to support the development of the relevant area by funding – (a) the provision, improvement, replacement, operation or maintenance of infrastructure; or (b) anything else that is concerned with addressing the demands that development places on an area.”

A total of £2.56m of funding was available for projects and the report pack proposed that £2.56m is allocated to fund 137 projects from across the borough.

The report pack noted that a range of changes had been made to the NCIL funding programme from the previous round in 2022-2024, including changes to the assessment of applications and feedback to applicants. The process for identifying and shortlisting Council-led capital projects was also described in the report pack.

“A panel of senior officers shortlisted proposals based on: • Does it meet the NCIL regulations? • Does it meet the Council's Corporate Priorities? • Does it meet a local need as assessed by Councillors and officers (preferably both)? • Is it deliverable? • Is it affordable? • Does it require ongoing revenue?”

The report pack included details of the scoring process for community-led projects:

“The scoring of applications was based on the following criteria: • Project summary and activities • Project need • Impact on the community • How it meets CIL regulations • Accessibility and equalities impact • How it meets corporate priorities • Value for money”

The report pack listed all of the projects that had been recommended for funding and provided a breakdown of the NCIL funding allocations to each of the 18 wards in Lewisham.

Housing Retrofit Strategy

The report pack included the Council’s Housing Retrofit Strategy. ⁴ The strategy set out a range of actions that the Council can take to improve the energy efficiency of homes across the borough.

The report pack stated that the strategy had been developed using data from an energy performance certificate (EPC) model for all homes in the borough and that it had been informed by a range of stakeholders:

“The Strategy has been developed using modelled housing data covering all tenures across the borough including the Council’s housing stock. The work has also been informed by discussions with internal and external stakeholders and draws on the approach taken by the London Councils led Retrofit London Housing Action Plan. ⁵”

The Housing Retrofit Strategy was described in the report pack as a response to recommendations from the 2022 Housing Retrofit Task and Finish Group ⁶ and from the Council’s Climate Emergency Action Plan ⁷. The strategy aligns to the following Corporate Priorities from Lewisham’s Corporate Strategy:

• Cleaner and Greener • A Strong Local Economy • Quality Housing • Health and Wellbeing

The report pack presented a summary of the principles that underpin delivery of the strategy:

“The draft Strategy seeks to present the material in as clear as possible a way although there are technical aspects to this work. A public-facing non-technical summary has been produced and is circulated alongside the detailed analysis. In February 2025 Ofgem announced details of the latest energy price cap, which is set to rise by 6.4% from April 2025, meaning an average annual bill of £1,849 for households paying by direct debit. This means the average household is set to pay over £800 more a year for their energy compared to 2020/21, a 77% increase, with gas double the price 4 years ago. Improving the energy efficiency of homes through investment in better insulation and upgrading windows and heating systems is a key focus of this Strategy. This aligns work that will achieve environmental benefits through reducing carbon emissions with cutting the cost of staying warm and heating homes across the borough. Lewisham Council provides an ongoing service to help those households most vulnerable to the cold with free and practical energy advice and support. In the last 4 years the Council’s energy advice service has supported over 3,500 vulnerable households to cut energy bills, manage energy debt and get access to boiler servicing and funding for insulation schemes.”

The report pack included a glossary explaining what is meant by retrofit:

“Works to improve energy efficiency and decarbonise heating and hot water use in homes. These works are typically insulation, upgrades to windows and other improvements to the fabric and energy efficiency of homes, alongside new ways to heat buildings and water that do not depend on fossil fuels such as gas.”

The report pack outlined the modelled costs of delivering full retrofit across all housing in the borough and across the Council’s housing stock, but noted that there is no commitment to fund this work.

The report pack also included the following actions from Lewisham’s Climate Emergency Action Plan:

• (2.1.1) Publish a Housing Retrofit Strategy in 2024/25 setting out a fully costed plan to retrofit the Council's housing stock. • (2.2.1) Publish a Housing Retrofit Strategy in 2024/25 setting out actions supporting decarbonisation of the borough's private rental stock. • (2.3.1) Publish a Housing Retrofit Strategy in 2024/25 that includes a range of actions supporting owner occupiers to decarbonise their homes. • (2.4.1) Publish a Housing Retrofit Strategy in 2024/25 that includes a range of actions supporting other social landlords in the borough to decarbonise their housing stock.

IHASS, Marsha Phoenix, Newstead Road Contract Extensions

The report pack included a request to extend 3 supported housing contracts. ⁸ The contracts were with:

• St Mungo’s for Newstead Road • Thames Reach for their Intensive Housing Advice & Support Service (IHASS) • Marsha Phoenix Memorial Trust

The report pack explained what these services do:

The Prevention, Inclusion and Public Health Commissioning Team (PIPHCT) commissions a range of floating & accommodation-based support services to meet the needs of homeless service users who require support to manage and maintain their accommodation.

It requested that they are all extended for a further two years.

The report pack described how the contracts were originally tendered in 2021 and how these contracts can be extended.

“The June 2021 Mayor and Cabinet approved the Marsha Phoenix Memorial Trust contract be issued to Marsha Phoenix Memorial Trust for 3 years from 1 April 2022 with the options to extend by 2 further years, details can be found in the background Mayor and Cabinet Report Dated June 2021 These approvals give the option to extend these contracts by 2 years. The recommendation is to extend the contracts for two years. The extension of contracts will ensure continuity of the service for vulnerable service users.”

The report pack also included the argument for funding the contracts at the agreed levels, following a review of all Supported Housing contracts in 2023. The review was in response to cost pressures and the risk of service closures.

“These pressures have been leading to service closures for providers outside of Lewisham. Paying the London Living Wage is a requirement on all contracts. In order to fund these pressures officers reviewed individual staffing costs for each service, and while some additional investment was secured for the mental health supported housing pathway from SLaM and SEL ICB, in September 2024 Mayor and Cabinet agreed the difficult decision to close a service to fund uplifts for the rest of the pathway to ensure services were fully funded and staff properly paid.”

The report pack contained a table comparing Lewisham contracts against other London Boroughs to benchmark the costs.

Out of Hours Switchboard Contract Extension

The report pack included a request to extend the out of hours switchboard contract with the Royal Borough of Greenwich for a further 3 years. The report pack provided details of how the contract had been awarded and performance against Key Performance Indicators (KPIs). The report pack also provided a rationale for the extension of the contract:

“The rationale to extend a contract with The Royal Borough of Greenwich for a period of three years is as follows: The Royal Borough of Greenwich has managed the Lewisham Out of Hours Switchboard since September 2015 providing Lewisham with savings of £200,000+ per annum when compared with running the service in-house. This has mainly been through leveraging economies of scale from Greenwich’s existing Out of Hours Switchboard which it could not achieve alone. Lewisham are able to benefit from the existing infrastructure, staff and management that are in place to run Greenwich’s own Out of Hours service. This allows the service to handle peaks in contact volumes, sickness absence, management and support & development activities such as training and reporting at a much lower overall cost.”

The report pack listed the services that are covered by the switchboard:

• Social services • Enablement • Noise pollution • Highways • Transport • Trees • Parks • Emergency Planning Procedures • Animal welfare/ Stray Dogs • Building/ Facilities issues and Keyholders • Dangerous structures • Housing (Homelessness, Rough Sleepers, Repairs) • Press/ Media Contacts • Customer Service Centre Management Escalations • COVID-19 Advice • Street Cleansing • Travellers • Registrars

The report pack also included a detailed service specification for the Out of Hours Switchboard. The service specification describes in detail the requirements of the service, including details on complaints handling:

“Where a complaint is in relation to the Lewisham’s own staff or service provisions, full details should be sent to the Lewisham contract manager as soon as possible in order that Lewisham may investigate, respond and take corrective action as applicable.”

Single Equalities Framework (2024-2028)

The report pack included a Single Equalities Framework ⁹ for adoption by the Mayor and Cabinet. The framework sets out the Council’s duties under the Public Sector Equality Duty, and presents 5 equality objectives for the next 4 years. The objectives are:

• Improving representation in the workforce • Making the borough more accessible • Increasing quality of life by tackling preventable illnesses • Improving how the Council considers the impact of intersectionality ¹⁰ in decision-making • Engaging and co-producing more effectively with residents

The framework describes how the objectives have been developed:

“The Council commissioned an independent and external group to undertake a benchmarking exercise of our equalities approach, and although the findings were positive, we know that there is more to do to create the step change in equalities that we want to achieve.”

The framework also includes analysis from the 2021 Census to provide a demographic overview of the borough.