05 : 14 am |10th September 2010

News

SUCCESS FOR SOCIAL ENTERPRISE

15/12/2004

ECT, one of the UK’s leading social enterprises, has won a major contract to provide recycling, refuse and street cleaning services to Ealing Council.

The seven-year agreement, worth around £10m a year, is the largest environmental services contract ever awarded to a social enterprise. Called Clean and Green, it is an integrated waste management contract that will combine a wide range of household, commercial and public services and help Ealing meet government targets for recycling and minimising damaging landfill.

ECT, which has provided kerbside recycling services to Ealing since 1995, was one of five organisations which tendered for the contract. ECT was selected because it scored best on both price and quality during a three-stage review by council officers, external advisors and cross-party panel of council members. A meeting of Ealing Council’s Cabinet yesterday (14 December) confirmed the win for the 25-year-old social enterprise.

Andy Bond, Managing Director of ECT, said: “We are delighted to have been chosen. As a social enterprise, our aim is to work in a way which is economically sustainable but also of direct social and environmental benefit to the community. We believe that investing our profits back into our projects benefits staff, the community and our partners.

“This is a ground-breaking time for ECT; we are proud to be the first social enterprise to win an environmental services contract of this magnitude but we are also looking forward to providing street cleaning and refuse collection services, alongside our well-established recycling services.”

He added; “We hope this leads the way for other social enterprises to get in there and compete for council contracts and encourages other local authorities to realise that keeping services in house or using large private companies are not the only options.”

The new contract, which will kick off in March, will provide an improved service for residents, schools and commercial organisations. Improving recycling rates will be key as Ealing aims to meet a statutory target of 30 per cent recycling/composting for 2005/6, and to keep within its landfill allocation and avoid penalty fines. A new kitchen waste collection service will be introduced in 2005 as part of the new contract.

ECT is one of the UK’s largest social enterprises with 650 staff and a £27 million turnover. It started 25 years ago providing transport services to Ealing residents and now provides services in public and community transport, recycling and engineering across the UK.

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For further information please contact Rowena Merrick or Esther Ferguson at Upward Curve on 020 8241 7091 / 020 8288 7828. Email Rowena@upwardcurve.co.uk or esther@upwardcurve.co.uk