Facilities Management

Making savings on the government estate

The government has recently published its Government Property Strategy, which aims to make savings by selling off property and making buildings more efficient. Government Business examines the strategy and how it can save the government money

The pandemic has highlighted the need for buildings to be flexible, with lockdowns leading to more people working from home and social distancing and health requirements meaning buildings need to be adaptable. The recent heatwave and drought have demonstrated the impact of global warming and underlined the need to cut carbon emissions – with such a large estate, the government is well placed to make big savings. Furthermore, the costof-living crisis has highlighted the need for the government to make savings to free up funds to spend elsewhere.

Published at the end of August, the Government Property Strategy is expected to save more than £2 billion through property sales and efficiencies.

The government estate is made up of hundreds of thousands of properties including prisons, courts, schools, museums, hospitals, job centres, military bases, administrative offices and much more. The estate includes 136,844 built assets, covers a floor area of 156.8 million m2 and has an annual running cost of £21.7 billion.

The strategy has an “achievements” section which shows the changes already made, including reducing the size of the central general purpose estate by 30 per cent since 2010 and reducing emissions by 57 per cent in 2020-2021 compared to 2009-10. An estimated 38 per cent of this reduction is due to improved management of the estate. Launching the strategy, Jacob ReesMogg, then-Minister for Brexit Opportunities and Government Efficiency said: “The public estate is a singular resource, with a significant impact. Its location, cost and effectiveness all have a direct relationship to the quality of public services and contribute to communities and places, driving economic growth throughout the UK. This includes delivering

Government’s levelling up commitments, part of which will reduce the number of Government offices in London and build a larger presence in the rest of the country.”

Property sales

Part of the strategy includes selling £1.5 billion worth of property assets over the next three years and supporting projects like Government Hubs which consolidates government staff into fewer buildings. The government estate is made up of hundreds of thousands of properties The plan also intends to make £500 million of savings by reducing operating costs, cutting spend on leases, and using modern building materials and energy sources. Mission One The Government Property Strategy has three missions. Mission One is to transform places and services. Mission Two is to create a smaller, better and greener public estate. Mission Three is to improve professional excellence and insight. Mission One is to transform places and services. This includes the government commitment to relocate Civil Service jobs outside London and into Levelling Up areas. The strategy is linked to the Places for Growth E

The Greening Government Commitments set out actions that UK government departments and their agencies will take to reduce their impact on the environment from 2021 to 2025.

 programme, which aims to move 22,000 civil service roles out of London by 2030. As part of the programme, 7,000 jobs have already been moved out of London, including 1,389 to Yorkshire and the Humber. 500 Home Office, Ministry of Justice and Department for Health and Social Care roles have already moved.

Mission One also commits to maximise on opportunities to exit from properties or co-locate services within existing properties. The Government Hubs project is seeing the consolidation of government staff into fewer buildings, by bringing together those from multiple government departments into a shared location to make more efficient use of space. The hubs project is expected to make savings of up to £300 million by 2025.

The One Public Estate programme brings public sector partners together to make the best use of public sector land and property in order to deliver efficiencies, local economic growth and more integrated customer services. Over three years, the programme is expected to make over £400 million capital receipts, £80 million running cost savings and provide land for over 10,000 homes and around 30,000 jobs.

The mission also intends to improve access and interoperability across the public sector to enable space to be shared between services and organisations. The Government Hubs project has interoperable IT and AV, logical adjacencies between teams and departments, virtual workspaces and on-site meeting and conference spaces. They also have a service desk with ICT fault reporting and diagnostics and FM service desk integration. The hubs have a shared network, providing guest access via GovWiFi and access to corporate networks via virtual networking.

Talking about the Government Hubs project, DEFRA said: “We have found that the variety of space available enabled different types of collaboration as well as for focused independent work. We’re now much more aware of how good building design can positively impact the way we work.”

Mission One also includes a commitment to invest £300 million in locally led grant funding, including the Brownfield Land Release Fund, which aims to unlock smaller brownfield sites across England for housing through the One Public Estate (OPE) programme. OPE has already seen some completed projects with an old Library in Waltham Forest being regenerated so it can be used to build 67 new houses and a Family & Homes hub.

The mission also commits to embed flexibility in estate design and construction to future proof the public estate. This includes uncertainty about future requirements being built into design for new buildings, for example through specification of flexible space which can be used for multiple purposes, through separation of shell and core from fit out or design to allow expansion and contraction without complex redesign.

Success in Mission One will be measured against the Places for Growth targets, by looking at the office footprint in each region and by assessing the cost savings.

Mission Two

Mission Two is to create a smaller, better and greener estate. The aim is for a smaller, more flexible estate, which reflects the requirements of a smaller Civil Service and modern public services. The estate should be more flexible and adaptable to meet changing demands and needs for property.

Mission Two commits to making £500 million of cumulative resource savings from the operating costs of the estate. Departments have already been asked to make five per cent savings against their operational budgets by 2024/2025.

To reduce the size of the estate, organisations will take a whole portfolio view of their assets and look at the potential value to other government priorities from repurposing or disposal. Costly, poor-quality properties should be prioritised for disposal.

A pipeline of disposals will be developed, which aims to generate gross capital receipts of £500m per annum, to fund investment in the estate which is to be kept.

Further estate savings by portfolio will be identified. Portfolio strategies should be in place across the estate by March 2023 to inform planning for the next Spending Review.

For the estate to be fit for purpose and in a good condition to meet the needs of a modern Civil Service, organisations will develop accessible and responsive spaces which enable delivery of flexible and inclusive services in supportive workplaces, enabled by FM professionals with the required skills and capabilities, who are supported by effective standards, tools, technology and organisation.

The strategy commits to improve the quality of estates across a number of departments including schools and prisons.

Feedback will be collected from customers on the quality of public buildings and this will be acted on. Quality and condition will be embedded in budget prioritisation and property investment decisions.

Greening Government

Mission Two also commits to deliver the Greening Government Commitments and 25 Year Environment Plan goals on net zero, adaptation, natural capital and resource efficiency.

The Greening Government Commitments set out actions that UK government departments and their agencies will take to reduce their impact on the environment from 2021 to 2025. These include targets for reducing water consumption, reducing greenhouse gas emissions and minimising waste and promoting resource efficiency.

To make the estate greener, an adaptation framework will be developed and embedded to enable consistent high standards in development and use of Adaptation Risk Assessment and Action Plan methodologies. Biodiversity and natural capital guidance will be developed and embedded for estate teams including guidance to maximise the impact of interventions in constrained urban sites. Sustainability requirements and standards for the whole lifecycle of the property will be built upon, from procurement, to construction to end of life.

The KPIs of Mission Two will be the size and annual running cost, capital value, land disposed, exits from central London offices, utilisation targets; resource savings and capital release; estate condition and customer satisfaction. Success will also be measured against Greening Government Commitments.

Organisations should develop property strategies setting objectives that take into account their individual business drivers and that are informed by the principles of the Strategy. Where property asset types are used by multiple organisations, portfolio strategies will be developed, setting objectives that take into account future cross-government demand, condition, sustainability and affordability for each asset class. These portfolio strategies should be in place by March 2023.

Rees-Mogg said: “We will transform the public estate to enable the updating of public services. The public estate has the potential to be at the vanguard of improving society, through helping to make our streets safer, supporting the NHS and educating children and adults.” L

FURTHER INFORMATION

Further information on KPIs, relevant departments and organisations within the government and related property programmes is available on the gov.uk website.

Advertisement Feature Taking control of the lighting controls industry

As Prime Light approaches its 30th birthday, we talk to Ben Brunton, controls director at Prime Controls, who tells us about the future of lighting controls and its wireless infrastructure controls system

Can you explain what a ‘wireless infrastructure’ is and tell us a bit more about lighting controls?

A wireless control infrastructure provides robust radio-agnostic protocols that enable smart nodes to communicate on wireless frequencies including Bluetooth (2.4GHz) and 868 MHz, enabling them to function as a centrally controlled network but with no singular point of failure.

Wireless control for lighting control has been implemented over the years, since lights are always present in every building and provide enough devices to create a strong network, whether that be a mesh or direct communication with transceivers, so they make for the perfect network. However, wireless is much more versatile and can help you transform your building into an ultra-smart one.

How easy is it to bolt these additional smart building solutions into the network?

Traditional control systems have worked by having local PIRs wired to luminaires or a centrally programmed hard-wired system throughout a building to control DALI or 1-10v luminaires. The major downside to both options is that they require additional wiring, or if used in a new build, the owner is then restricted to the hard-wired control layout installed unless they pay for a specialist engineer to recommission the system.

Our future-proof system requires no additional wiring, with wireless controls you simply connect the new sensor to the existing network and drag it onto the system using a tablet. The infrastructure’s already there, so you already have an existing ‘ready-to-go’ network in the building.

In summary, wireless controls offer the end user a lower overall cost solution that offers more flexibility, control, and the potential for enhanced saving due to the flexibility and the ease of making changes when the environment is changed.

What insight can you give us into the future of lighting controls?

Smart Buildings are not only becoming more popular, but they are also becoming commonplace within large sectors like councils, healthcare, and housing; due to regulations, compliance, and the need to work towards a net-zero goal.

When you put a lighting control system in, then you can improve the intelligence of your building in so many other ways. You’ll not only have an efficient lighting network, but you can then add in elements like air quality sensors, leak detection, CO2 level monitoring, daylight harvesting, automatic blinds, and much more.

There are so many devices being brought to market that will be compatible with these networks, therefore future opportunities are limitless. Essentially if you’ve got a sensor and you can give us a signal, we can put it on our network however that evolves in the future.

To add to existing regulations, it was announced on 15th June 2022 that new requirements of Building Regulations Part L will come into effect in England. These changes will affect all parties involved with building assets, including consultants, contractors, and lighting engineers. This new change will apply to new universities, new schools, new government buildings, and any type of non-domestic development, so it’s critical to prepare now to guarantee compliance.

With increasing cybercrime, isn’t security a big concern when it comes to lighting controls and smart building networks?

As security is a major concern for our customers, our controls solution and secure protocol have been designed with security in mind as well as preventative measures in place for cyber-attacks.

Every device can pass its data onto the next one, to pass it back to a gateway that sends information to a Web Server, so no information is ever held on-site. Our security keys change 10 times every second, supplying bank-style security that is incredibly secure and reliable.

What trends are you currently seeing in terms of customer demands for lighting controls?

With ever-increasing energy prices in the UK, it’s becoming increasingly important for large organisations to analyse ways in which they can reduce their energy spending, and none are easier than LED lighting and associated controls.

We’re seeing more companies approach us with concerns relating to energy bills, even after installing LED, and how they can make further savings. Wireless lighting controls are perfect for this as they can be easily retrofitted & offer further savings based on presence detection, daylight control & scheduled dimming in certain areas (such as out-of-hours stocking within retail). Emergency lighting is also a high priority for companies with multiple premises. Our self-testing wireless emergency system can automatically test, report and schedule emergency lighting with any identified failures being flagged within one hour, including location and cause of the fault. This not only eliminates the requirement for an onsite manual test but also guarantees compliance.

And what are the overall benefits of smart building tech?

The possibilities are endless with smart building tech. Lighting Controls give you the backbone to turn your building into a truly smart and efficient one, from HVAC integration allowing adjustment of heating based on occupancy to a selfload managed property where lighting can reduce its load within limits to allow other devices to keep the overall building electrical consumption as low as possible.

For me, the main benefit to a building manager or owner is having peace of mind. To know that your building is compliant, to be able to remotely visualise the activities of your building, and to see that the risk levels are lower - these are all hugely beneficial and in turn, can save you a lot of energy in the long run. L

FURTHER INFORMATION

+44 (0)20 8968 2000 www.primecontrols.co.uk Bb@primecontrols.co.uk