Following the October 2010 CSR, there is increased pressure on
central government departments to deliver quality frontline
services at substantially reduced levels of funding over the next
four years.
One of the key challenges facing government is the public sector
estate. Worth an estimated £380bn and costing £25bn a year to run,
the estate presents a potentially vast source of substantial
savings.
Capita Symonds’ integrated real estate
expertise covers the whole property life cycle, enabling our
clients to address and overcome their property challenges through
improved co-location strategies; stakeholder engagement and
management; developer and landlord negotiations; workspace
planning; ongoing property & asset management; and the
maximisation of disposal income.
The key to effective estates rationalisation
lies in driving out excess space, relocating out of inefficient
buildings, and consolidating into new, modernised and flexible
property while introducing new ways of working. For example it is
estimated that through better asset and property management alone
the 14.5sqm per desk that central government occupies could
potentially be reduced to 10.5sqm. Writing in his 2009 Operational
Efficiency Programme, Lord Carter of Coles concluded that using
central government's offices more intensively could reduce its need
for office accommodation by 30%, saving £1bn a year.
Furthermore, slimming down the remainder of
the estate by 20% over the next ten years could cut running costs
by between £2-4bn a year. Through relocation to lower cost, but
arguably better quality accommodation, property can also be used as
a catalyst to achieve the wider transformational aspirations of the
coalition government.
Nevertheless, in order to achieve these
savings we will still require transformational capability of an
unprecedented scale, focused upon people and behaviour, rather than
desk utilisation studies and furniture solutions.