Trident to expand with Connaught contract
The chief executive of West Midlands housing association Trident Group has told Insider that the company plans to expand its workforce after rescuing £20m of contracts from failed housing repairs contracting giant Connaught. John Morris said the company will increase its new Trident Homes Maintenance Team after taking its day-to-day maintenance work in-house.
Connaught entered into administration with £200m of debts last month. Rival contractor Morgan Sindall took over the majority of the company's work, but not all employees and repairs contracts were transferred.
Trident rescued its £20m day-to-day maintenance and empty homes contract with Exeter-based Connaught by bringing repairs in-house, saving 50 jobs and creating the Trident Homes Maintenance Team.
Morris said: “We decided fairly quickly that we would recover the contract. We had early warning that Connaught was in trouble. We hoped everything would be fine for them, but once it became clear that it wouldn’t be, it was a matter of days before we knew we’d take the contract on.”
Morris said the company had three choices about the future of the contract with Connaught.
“We could just have our contracts moved to another contractor, find a contractor ourselves, or do the work ourselves,” he explained. “We had to think about what we could take in-house. We knew we could take refurbishment and improvement work, as well as planned maintenance. We have also brought the cleaning in-house with the new team.”
He added that the group planned to expand its employee base with the addition of jobs throughout the year, as well as apprenticeship schemes.
Morris said: “We are taking on ten Connaught workers including a manager, supervisor and providing vehicles, tools and other parts of the Connaught infrastructure, all of which will be incorporated into Trident’s Asset Management Team.”
He added that the move “shows what housing associations can do above and beyond private contractors”.
Trident operates in Birmingham, the Black Country, Warwickshire, Worcestershire and South Derbyshire.
