The firm saw revenue for the six months to 30 June 2016 rise by 3.3 per cent to hit £210m, up from £203.4m in the same period a year earlier. CEO Wayne Sheppard said that current trading remained at “normal seasonal levels” despite the vote to leave the European Union, and added that the firm had contingency plans in place to help the firm “balance production with sales volumes as necessary” for the remainder of the year. Following the EU referendum, like-for-like brick volumes in July were at the same levels as the same month a year earlier. “The [housing] sector continues to receive focused government support, mortgage availability is good and there remains an undersupply of new homes,” he said. “Our businesses are well prepared for the challenges and opportunities that our markets may present and we look to the future with confidence.” EBITDA for the first six months of the year increased by 7.3 per cent, reaching £55.6m, up from £51.8m in H1 2015. The firm added that its brick business was seeing strong levels of activity from the housing market, which has offset destocking by UK merchants and distributors. Its concrete products business also performed strongly, receiving a boost from an increase in activity in domestic landscaping RM&I work. The brick manufacturer’s results tally with data released this week by the Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy, which showed brick deliveries and stocks in Q2 2016 were at their highest levels for nearly three years. Source link

The King’s Cross Central Limited Partnership (KCCLP), advised by Savills, has let the Midland Goods Shed at King’s Cross to consumer finance provider NewDay. The deal sees NewDay relocate from Two Pancras Square and double its take up on the scheme to 30,000 sq ft (2,790 sq m). The Grade II Listed Midland Goods Shed built in 1850 has been sympathetically restored and converted into a contemporary design, led by Bennetts Associates. The building is in the heart of King’s Cross, next to the Waitrose food store and cookery school, Central Saint Martins and Everyman Cinema, which will be opening in 2017. Stuart Lawson, director in the Central London team at Savills, comments: “The deal to NewDay was agreed 10 days prior to the EU referendum and concluded only 10 days afterwards. The speed of transaction coupled with a substantial rental increase makes this a significant leasing agreement and a strong indicator of continued confidence in the central London office market.” Will Colthorpe, partner at Argent (KCCLP), adds: “NewDay’s announcement is more good news for King’s Cross. It is a testament to King’s Cross, and the ongoing success of the development, to have re-let the space so quickly to a leading consumer finance provider.  By mid- 2017 we expect to have over 12,000 people working at King’s Cross, confirming its reputation as London’s new office destination and leading the way in workplace design and performance.” This deals leaves approximately 800,000 sq ft (74,320 sq m) of the 3 million sq ft (278,700 sq m) of office space  available at King’s Cross.Newton Perkins acted for NewDay; Savills is jointly instructed with Cushman and Wakefield on behalf of KCCLP. Source link

27 July 2016 | Herpreet Kaur Grewal NG Bailey has been awarded both the landlord and tenant facilities services contracts by Land Securities and global bank Mizuho to maintain Mizuho House, 30 Old Bailey in London. Worth more than £1 million, NG Bailey’s contracts are in addition to the company’s facilities services contract at 60 Ludgate Hill, which sits beside Mizuho House as part of Land Securities’ grade A office development, New Ludgate. The facilities services briefs include mechanical, electrical and building fabric operational maintenance, as well as 24-hour critical services support to occupier Mizuho through NG Bailey’s critical environment specialists and its building management systems. NG Bailey held the facilities services contract to maintain Mizuho’s previous London head office at Bracken House, near St Paul’s Cathedral. As part of this new contract, it will also provide soft landings support to Mizuho in the transition to the new building, which will accommodate more than 1,600 employees across 200,000 square feet of office space. Stuart Linington, managing director of NG Bailey’s facilities services division, said: “We currently manage eight retail centres and 40 commercial properties for Land Securities across the country and have a strong relationship with the company, built over many years, so it’s fantastic to be continuing this at Mizuho House.” Source link

Browser does not support script. Contact us Michael Maser PRIBA – portrait by Desmond O’Neill RIBA Immediate Past President Stephen Hodder said: “I am very sorry to hear about Michael Manser’s sad death. Michael designed some of the most breathtaking and inspiring one-off houses of the late twentieth century, built in his pure, modernist style. He championed well-designed housing throughout his career, encouraging the public to demand and mass house builders to supply better designed homes – for many years the RIBA presented an annual housing prize in his name, the Manser Medal. Michael’s work is an inspiration to so many and he will be greatly missed. I for one will miss his wonderful anecdotes, his wise counsel and warm smile.” Tony Chapman FRIBA, former RIBA Head of Awards said: “The sad death of Michael Manser marks an end point in British modernism as applied to domestic architecture. The best of his houses from the 60s, 70s and 80s with their rational plans and brave use of generous near-frameless glazing showed him to be the English heir to Mies. Michael continued to be as excited by new ideas in architecture as he was angered by bad ideas and bad buildings. He took the subject seriously, never more so than when judging houses for the prize on his name. He was generous and encouraging to younger architects, particularly those on whom he detected some sign of the same spark that drove his own young projects. For all that his modernism was rooted in the past, in the classicism of the eighteenth an early nineteenth centuries. Those of us who spent much time on his company – and what a pleasure that was – heard his views on the primacy of proportion in Regency architecture hundreds of times. But equally he admired those who pushed against the rules, particularly when laid down by planners. His other bete noir was the British Housebuilder and he saw at one of the major tasks of his later life to reward examples of the work good architects who set higher benchmarks for all housing. “We will probably not see his like again.” ENDS The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) champions better buildings, communities and the environment through architecture and our members www.architecture.com   Follow us on Twitter for regular RIBA updates www.twitter.com/RIBA   Posted on Wednesday 8th June 2016 Source link

4 August 2016 | Herpreet Kaur Grewal The Home Office contract with Yarl’s Wood Immigration Centre for women in Bedfordshire is “over-engineered and creates large theoretical financial credits for even trivial deviations”, according to a new National Audit Office report.  The Home Office is responsible for all aspects of Yarl’s Wood except healthcare, which is now the responsibility of NHS England. The report into the management arrangements of the new contracts between the Home Office and Serco, and NHS England’s deal with G4S, was published last month. The report highlights the following example of ‘over-engineering’: If the Yarl’s Wood gym is opened five minutes later than agreed, this could generate a service credit. But if the gym is kept open for an extra five minutes at the end of the day, this would be “acceptable mitigation and the service credit would not be imposed”. The Home Office has imposed £56,000 of such service credits out of a total of £585,600 credits generated, because it considered that there were mitigating circumstances for the vast majority of them. The Home Office, says the report, is now in the process of reducing the number of performance indicators from 120 to around 30, “so that it can focus on any serious problems rather than requiring Serco to report every technical deviation from the contract and the mitigations it put in place”. It also states that G4S has been “slow to meet its contractual obligations for training”, noting that the contract was required to provide training to all staff at Yarl’s Wood on mental health issues. Amyas Morse, head of the National Audit Office, said: “It is important that services for vulnerable people, like those at Yarl’s Wood, are delivered ‘right first time’ and this did not happen at Yarl’s Wood. We do though give credit for the work that is now taking place to address the problems.” Serco was re-awarded the Yarl’s Wood contract in 2014 after emerging as the preferred contractor “following a comprehensive re-tendering process”. A report on an unannounced inspection of the Immigration Removal Centre (IRC) for women, published last year, stated that the running of the centre was “improving, although significant concerns remained”. Source link