Onward Homes publishes second ESG report
Onward has published its second Environmental, Social, Governance (ESG) report highlighting its commitment to providing warmer and more comfortable homes.
Despite a challenging economic environment, Onward has invested over £75 million into their homes last year, retrofitted 132 homes and revealed plans to improve the energy efficiency of a further 828 homes with £6.8 million in funding from the Government’s Social Housing Decarbonisation Fund. In the last year, 100% of Onward’s new builds reached EPC B, and 73.7% of their existing homes with an EPC certificate reached EPC C.
Bronwen Rapley, Chief Executive at Onward, said:
“Our second ESG report provides examples of where we are making The Onward Difference, whether that’s retrofitting our homes to make them warmer and more comfortable for customers, providing new homes to help people put down roots in their communities, or providing training so that our colleagues are equipped to provide an excellent service to our customers.
“We have secured further funds to provide more sustainable homes for our customers in the future, boosting our capacity to deliver major improvements to our homes, making them more energy efficient in the long-term. We will continue to invest in our communities, colleagues, and services, so that we can enable our customers to be their best, in a home they love, and a place they are proud of.”
The report details our annual performance against the 48 criteria set out by Sustainability Reporting Standard for Social Housing. Other highlights from 2022/23 include:
- Investing over £800k into Onward communities through their Social Investment programme.
- Building more genuinely affordable housing, with 308 new homes delivered.
- Supporting 2,922 customers by generating £2.2million in extra income.
- 99.92% of homes met the Decent Homes Standard.
- Launching the Onward Academy, a network of organisations that will support training and employment opportunities for customers.
Onward delivered this performance whilst retaining its G1/ V2 rating from the Regulator of Social Housing, and a strong credit rating of A1 with negative outlook from Moody’s Investors Services, which demonstrates that it has a strong and stable foundation to deliver for our customers.
You can find Onward’s second ESG Report here – http://www.onward.co.uk/app/uploads/2023/11/Onwards-ESG-Report-2022-2023.pdf