Found asbestos in a Southampton home? Start here

Southampton’s housing runs from Victorian and Edwardian terraces through to interwar and post war estates. Each hides asbestos in different places. The terraces in Portswood, St Denys, Freemantle and Bevois Valley tend to hold the lower risk materials, textured ceilings and old floor tiles added during later modernising. The estates at Thornhill, Weston and Millbrook are where the higher risk materials turn up, because insulating board and pipe lagging were normal when they were built. The streets closest to the docks and the old Woolston shipyards carry their own history, which the section further down explains. What decides whether you legally need a licensed firm is the material itself, not the age of the house.

Every HSE licensed asbestos contractor covering Hampshire

There are eight firms holding a licence with a Hampshire address. The trade association directory that most people find first only lists the ones that pay for membership, so it comes out shorter. This is the full licensed set, straight from the register.

Every firm on this list holds a standard licence, which is the type that covers removal work.

Two things about the Hampshire list worth knowing

• None of them are based in Southampton itself. They sit out at Fareham, Eastleigh and Hook and cover the city from there, so the address in the table is where the office is, not how far the firm will travel. Fareham or Eastleigh to Southampton is a short run.
• Eight firms is not many for a county this size. Expect to wait for the better ones, and expect firms from Dorset, Wiltshire and West Sussex to quote for Southampton work too. That is normal, and a wider field often gets you a keener price.

Getting rid of asbestos in Southampton is harder than in most cities

Southampton’s household waste and recycling centre, the City Depot and Recycling Park on First Avenue in Millbrook, does not take asbestos at all. The council’s own hazardous waste page says the same and points you to no other council route. So unlike much of the country, where a local tip will take double bagged cement, Southampton gives residents no disposal option of their own.

That leaves one legal route. A licensed waste carrier, or the removal contractor, takes the material away and gives you the paperwork that proves where it went. Every firm in the list above does this as part of the job.

The South East sits above the national mesothelioma rate

Southampton was a working dock and shipbuilding city for more than a century. The docks, the Thornycroft and later Vosper shipyards at Woolston, and the ocean liners fitted out here all used asbestos heavily for lagging, insulation and fire protection. The men who worked around it are the generation showing up in the figures now, because mesothelioma can take decades to appear. A rate measured today reflects work done in the 1960s and 70s.

The South East of England records 63.7 asbestos related mesothelioma deaths per million men, above the Great Britain figure of 55.9. Figures from the HSE’s mesothelioma statistics for Great Britain.

What asbestos removal in Southampton is likely to cost

Southampton sits in the higher labour band of the South East. Expect prices above the Midlands and the North, and below central London. Where the city adds its own cost is access. Tight terraced streets with no rear lane, parking limits near the centre, and flats above the fourth floor all add time, and time is what you are paying for. For the wider picture, see what asbestos removal costs across the UK, and where the published price guides disagree.

Asbestos removal in Southampton: questions people ask

Will the council remove asbestos from my house?

No. Southampton City Council does not offer asbestos removal to homeowners. Council tenants are the exception and should report it through their housing repairs line rather than arranging anything themselves.

Can I take asbestos to the tip in Southampton?

No. The City Depot and Recycling Park on First Avenue does not accept asbestos, and the council lists no other drop off point. It has to leave with a licensed carrier or the removal firm.

Do I always need a licensed contractor?

Not for every material. The law treats some lower risk asbestos cement as non-licensed work, while insulating board, pipe lagging and sprayed coatings must go to a firm holding a standard licence. The safe move is to have the material identified by a lab first, so you know which rules apply before anyone touches it. See our guide to what an asbestos survey costs.

How many licensed contractors are near me?

8 hold a current licence with a Hampshire address. Firms based in Dorset, Wiltshire and West Sussex also work across Southampton, so your real choice is wider than the table.

Getting a quote from a Southampton contractor

The firms above quote for city work routinely, and so do firms in the neighbouring counties. To widen the field, see the licensed contractors covering the rest of Hampshire.

Not in Southampton? See every area we cover.