Great Portland launches new community strategy

Great Portland Estates announced the launch of its new community-focussed feel-good strategy on Thursday, titled ‘creating sustainable relationships’.

The FTSE 250 firm said the strategy recognised the importance of its social impact, and the relationships that it needed to build to ensure the long-term success of the business.

Its board said the company had a long tradition of supporting local causes and donating to charitable organisations, and ‘creating sustainable relationships’ helped put its ambition in practice on issues that directly impacted London through specific initiatives.

The company was expanding educational opportunities and apprenticeships across its portfolio, increasing urban greening at its properties, and also measuring the social impact of its developments.

It also committed to work with Centrepoint as its corporate charity partner for the next three years.

Centrepoint supports more than 9,200 homeless young people a year - many of them within London - through the provision of accommodation, health support and life skills to get them back in education, training and employment;

Great Portland would also provide funding over the next three years to Groundwork London to install green screening around the perimeters of playgrounds in a number of London schools, in order to measure the impact on local air quality, and join the Wild West End initiative, which focuses on improving green infrastructure across London's West End.

“We believe that this strategy, coupled with our commitment to integrating the measurement of social impact through the design and construction of our buildings, will deliver lasting benefit for the communities in which we are working,” said Great Portland Estates chief executive Toby Courtauld.