Report 01/13

Improving poor estates - Awards by the HEFCE 2001

Read on-line

Report - Improving poor estates - Awards by the HEFCE 2001

Annex A - Membership of the advisory panel

Annex B - Improving poor estates: awards for 2001

Download

Report and annex

[ MS Word 91K | Zipped MS Word 42K | PDF 32K | Zipped PDF 27K ]

Executive summary

Purpose

1. This document announces the awards by the HEFCE under the 2001 initiative to improve poor estates.

Key points

2. We received 79 bids for funds, requesting £208 million for projects estimated to cost £612 million. Following a two-stage assessment process, we agreed to fund 32 projects with total funding of £65 million.

Action required

3. No action is required.

Background

4. HEFCE 00/32 invited institutions to bid for funds to improve poor estates. This was the fourth and final year of the poor estates initiative. The initiative was targeted at major capital refurbishments and projects related to restructuring and more efficient use of space.

5. Institutions were expected to provide funds to match the contribution requested from the Council.

6. An advisory panel drawn from the HEFCE Board and the sector's representative bodies (Universities UK and the Standing Conference of Principals) oversaw the competition. Details of the panel's membership are attached at Annex A.

Assessment

7. The initiative was run in two phases:

1. Institutions submitted project definitions in a standard format by 23 October 2000. We received 79 bids for funds, requesting £208 million for projects estimated to cost £612 million. The advisory panel agreed a screening process, which was applied to produce a long-list of projects.
2. The panel scored the long-list of bids and made recommendations on funding.

Awards

8. We originally set aside £105 million for the financial years 1998-2001. We have now set aside £298.5 million for the period 1998-2002. Based on the recommendations of the advisory panel, this year we are committing £65 million to 32 projects phased over three years. The awards are listed at Annex B.

9. All institutions have been offered a grant, subject to the following:

1. Where actual project costs exceed the bid estimate, the level of grant will not be increased.
2. Where actual project costs are below the bid estimate, the level of grant will be reduced pro-rata.
3. No institution is being offered more than £4 million.

Conditions of grant

10. Awards are subject to institutions providing further information, and HEFCE estates advisers will contact successful institutions to agree project costs, profiles of expenditure and the method of grant payment.

Audit and evaluation

11. The awards will be audited to check that the work described in the bid has been carried out, and that value for money has been obtained from the funds.

12. We are undertaking an evaluation to assess the impact of the initiative.