The Council's Executive Committee today approved recommendations for City Building, the former Building Services Department of Glasgow City Council, to undertake the work, on behalf of the Council, to replace boilers, fit insulation and install smoke and carbon monoxide detectors in homes.
Around 10 boiler installations per week can be accommodated by the firm, which will help to shrink the six month waiting list facing Glasgow’s householders aged sixty or more.
With demand outstripping funding to deliver the programme and changes to the scheme making more people eligible for heating repairs and boiler replacement, Communities Scotland, the Scottish Government’s housing and regeneration agency, began to approach local authorities directly to gauge their capacity to assist Scottish Gas, the original contractors.
City Building will undertake the work under guidance from Communities Scotland, who in liaison with Social Services and NHS Greater Glasgow will identify the most vulnerable groups ensuring that they are made main priority for repairs or boiler replacements.
Costs for the work will be absorbed into existing Council budgets.
City Building will be contacting the first forty customers next week with a view to completing their installations and repairs by the end of this financial year (31 March 2008).
The firm have also indicated to Communities Scotland that they have the capacity to carry out a substantial further programme of work from the beginning of the new financial year.
Councillor George Ryan, Executive Member for Development and Regeneration, said: "Fuel poverty and incidences of cold-related illness are real problems for our older residents, especially at this time of year. I am delighted that we are able to aid the central heating programme, helping to ease this financial burden and improve the quality of life of Glasgow’s over sixties."
City Building (Glasgow) LLP was formed in 2006, evolving from the former Building Services Department of Glasgow City Council. It operates as an autonomous company and with its own board and managing director, enabling the organisation to deliver quality construction services across the public and private sectors.