On Wednesday, we held our 2025 Annual General Meeting (AGM) at our office, an opportunity to get together with our directors, board members and shareholders to review our performance, sign our financial statements and discuss our bold plans. Here are the top takeaways…
“Investing in existing homes must be top of our agenda“: Amanda’s ambitions
Amanda Davies, Chair of the Board, opened the meeting by reflecting on her first year as Chair. When she took on the role, it quickly became clear to her where we need to focus our efforts, including:
- Investing in our homes by committing £172 million to make sure our homes are fit for the future over the next 10 years, and they continue to be safe, warm and dry.
- Listening to our customers’ experiences and discussing them at every board meeting.
- Investing in new technology and managing the risks. This meant growing our technology and finance teams over the year and appointing Matt Lucas, Director of Technology, Digital and Data to make sure we can safely introduce new systems.
Amanda also emphasised the importance of building and acquiring new homes to strengthen our financial position and give more people the opportunity to put down roots in Bridgend. She said:
“We know in Wales there is a housing crisis. A well-managed, risk-managed growth programme is good for the business. It will bring in income that will allow us to invest in our current homes”.
A moment of reflection!
We were also proud to share the things we achieved between April 2024-25, including:
- Providing a safe and affordable home to 256 families from Bridgend Council’s housing register.
- Completing 26,000 repairs and achieving a 90% post-repair satisfaction rating!
- Investing £11.8 million in our current homes.
We can’t wait for the projects we’ve got lined up, like starting work on our largest ever development on Ewenny Road, launching phase two of our Growth for Good project, and moving to a new office in the heart of Bridgend.
You asked, Amanda and the panel answered…
We invited you, our customers to submit your questions for our AGM panel, made up of Amanda, Jo Oak (CEO), David Wilton (Chief Executive at TPAS Cymru), and Rebecca Hopkins (Valleys to Coast customer panel member).
Question: As a customer, why do you think it’s important that customers like yourself have a say? You’ve shared that your son has additional needs. What can we do to better help customers with vulnerabilities and listen to their experiences?
Rebecca – “Use simple language, visual aids, and train staff to understand that not all disabilities are visual. My son has autism, but you wouldn’t know this by looking at him. I hope in the future that he has his own voice, but for now, I’m his voice. Please remember that we are people, not problems, and we know first hand how your services affect us”.
David: “The whole housing sector is focused on work around inclusion. We know we need to offer a full menu of ways for people to get involved. There may be people with disabilities who are awake in the middle of the night who can complete a survey. It’s about giving people a variety of ways to share their views. It can be worse to have a limited customer voice than none at all, as this can steer us in the wrong direction. We also want our customers to be champions and advocates for this within the community.”
Question: Some of our customers asked about the investment we are making in developing new homes and estates – in particular around our recent announcement of our large development in Ewenny Road in Maesteg – people are asking what the long term benefits will be?
Jo: “It’s not just about building homes, it’s about building communities. By building 200 homes in Ewenny road, we’re building a new community in Maesteg that will thrive over the next decade. “
Amanda: “Having an active growth programme brings more revenue. As a board, our current focus is on investing in our current homes but we need to be smart about how we do that. The Welsh Housing Quality Standards are a guide for us and we need to prioritise this and building new homes allows us to improve our housing stock. We’ve also invested in our assets team to help us do this.”
Other questions that were submitted by customers will be answered on our website soon.
Finally, we presented our financial statements to the attendees, which outline our full financial position.
Read our financial statementsWe wrapped up by saying a fond farewell to three board members, Joy Ogeh-Hutfield, Mark Woloshak and Jo Smith. We thanked them for their incredible contribution and dedication during their time as board members and wished them well for the future.
