Trades & Services : Property & Facilities Management News

Simian Skill Dubai Passes the CISRS Annual Accreditation Audit

Simian Skill Dubai has recently passed the CISRS Annual accreditation audit. The company has completed another year of their training in the UAE throughout the 2016/17 period. Simian Skill has been operating in this area since 2013 and the company have managed to sustain a high standard for their training

Read More »

Jet Aire Has Recently Appointed Simon Lawton to Their Board

Jet Aire, the Leeds based company has recently appointed Simon Lawton to their board as a non-executive chairman. Simon has been working with the drainage contractors since 2014 on a number of different ad hoc projects. Over the course of the past six months, Simon Lawton has been working with

Read More »

Britcon Announced That They Have Made Three New Senior Appointments

Britcon has announced that they have made three new senior appointments at their offices in Wakefield. The Building and civil engineering business has now increased their Yorkshire base team numbers to 12 with the new appointments. The Wakefield base was first opened in 2014 and over the past 12 months

Read More »

Beautiful show homes now open to view at Tall Trees

Award-winning house builder Kier Living Eastern has revealed three superb show homes now available for viewing at its Tall Trees development in historic Potton. The Mayfair, an attractive four-bedroom home, the three-bedroom Bluebell and The Palmerston, also three bedrooms, give visitors a glimpse of the chance of an attractive lifestyle

Read More »

Dunton Environmental Has Acquired a New One-acre in Northgate

Dunton Environmental is a remediation firm that is one of the leading companies for design and implementation or ground and water remediation solutions. This remediation is carried out for the purposes of land restoration. The remediation consultants have recently acquired a new one-acre site in Northgate. This site in Northgate,

Read More »

Consultation on the UK Air Quality Plan Has Been Published

The consultation on the UK Air Quality Plan has been published. Matthew Pencharz has spoken out after the publishing of the Plan by the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs, or Defra. The former Deputy Mayor of London, Matthew Pencharz has said that the Government needs to do more

Read More »
Latest Issue
Issue 334 : Nov 2025

Trades : Property & Facilities Management News

AECOM Announced That They Have Been Appointed to Create a Technical Advisory Service

AECOM has announced that they have been appointed to create a technical advisory service for the Priority School Building Programme 2. The global infrastructure service provider was selected for the role by the Education and Skills Funding Agency. The Programme 2 rebuild is part of the Priority School Building Programme, a scheme that was created by the government. This Programme will see the government invest £4.4 billion in to rebuilding and refurbishing the school buildings around the country that are classified as being in the very worst condition. While in this role AECOM will be expected to deliver a variety of multidisciplinary services in order to help with the rebuilding and refurbishment of the schools around the UK. The services AECOM will provide to this programme include architecture, quantity surveying, structural engineering as well as Mechanical and Electrical engineering. The infrastructure service firm will also provide the project with a range of procurement advisory services and a range of feasibility services which cover geotechnical, acoustic, building condition, ecology, flood risk assessment and topographical services. To begin with, the contract with AECOM will cover 15 different schools in four different geographical batches: Midlands; Leicestershire; South One, covering Norfolk and Somerset; and South Two, which includes Hertfordshire. Depending on how well the programme works in these areas, and if it is successful, more batches could be added to the Programme throughout the four-year contract. The work on the Priority School Building Programme started immediately and it ids thought that it will continue up until 2020. The second phase of the Building Programme began in 2014 as different local authorities, dioceses, sixth form colleges, academies and academy trusts were first asked to submit their expressions of interest for either an entirely new school site or for one or multiple buildings to receive funding as part of the programme. AECOM’s contract covers those that are being taken forward from this initial selection process and it is thought that the programme will improve the conditions for hundreds of different school children around the country.

Read More »

Irwin Mitchell Announced That Adrian Barlow Is the New National Head of Real Estate

Irwin Mitchell has announced that they have appointed Adrian Barlow for the position of National Head of Real Estate. The Pinsent Masons’ partner has been appointed to this role within the Law firm where it is planned that he will lead his own team of more than 30 commercial real estate partners. The Irwin Mitchell role will be based in London where Adrian Barlow will be responsible for his team or more than 30 commercial real estate partners and more than 40 other commercial real estate lawyers. Although Adrian’s role is based in London, these team members will be spread across eight different offices in the UK. Adrian has a good deal of experience in the real estate industry as he managed to successfully lead Pinsent Masons’ Property Group between 2004 and 2016. Adrian’s experience has a client focus as he has worked advising both public and private sector organisations with things such as project strategy and real estate portfolio. Adrian has also given advice to companies about business change management from a legal perspective. As part of his work, Adrian Barlow has offered advice regarding real estate to a number of different household names including businesses that are in the FTSE 100 and foreign companies. Adrian is said to be an excellent leader, and hopefully should flourish in his new role at Irwin Mitchell. His career at Pinsent Masons included being a senior sponsor for the Diversity & Inclusion agenda. Adrian Barlow is also a trustee of the Ouseley Trust where he sits on the main board and finance committee. Adrian’s appointment reflects the company’s ambition to increase their Business Legal Services division. Irwin Mitchell intend to carry out their growth plans through appointing people like Adrian who have good experience and track record in this sector in order to make sure that they can continue to offer a high standard of customer service.

Read More »

Simian Skill Dubai Passes the CISRS Annual Accreditation Audit

Simian Skill Dubai has recently passed the CISRS Annual accreditation audit. The company has completed another year of their training in the UAE throughout the 2016/17 period. Simian Skill has been operating in this area since 2013 and the company have managed to sustain a high standard for their training delivery as well as maintaining the ethos of quality over quantity while working in a hard commercial environment where clients would rather avoid any forms of formal off site training. Instead their clients prefer short duration in house training or skills testing to make sure that the least amount to time is lost with training. It is thought that the CISRS Overseas Scaffolder Training Scheme is getting a stronger reputation and is receiving an increasing amount of support over the years as more and more companies notice the benefits of setting out their training like the UK standard training programmes. CISRS is the preferred training scheme for a number of different major organisations. Recently, the training centre has completed the training for a number of different blue chip organisations such as the Oil Rig Construction company Lamprell Ltd as well as Carillion and Shell Oil. The training business has also been working with some of the biggest international scaffolding companies. These scaffolding companies that have undergone training with CISRS include Hertel, SGB and Kaefer. Simian Skills has been offering a variety of different qualifications such as Level 1 scaffolder, Basic Scaffold Inspection and Scaffolding Supervisor training. The Skills company has also delivered Level 2 scaffolder courses and are the first in the region to offer CISRS Level 3 Scaffolder courses. Simian skill have aa presence in the CISRS CENTER IN Ogun, Nigeria and it id though that at some point this month the business will be working for the CISRS accreditation for a training centre that located in Chennai, India.

Read More »

Jet Aire Has Recently Appointed Simon Lawton to Their Board

Jet Aire, the Leeds based company has recently appointed Simon Lawton to their board as a non-executive chairman. Simon has been working with the drainage contractors since 2014 on a number of different ad hoc projects. Over the course of the past six months, Simon Lawton has been working with the directors and the senior management team in order to lay foundations for the next stage of the company’s growth. The company is looking to expand their presence in the provision of professional drainage solutions to the company’s commercial, industrial and domestic clients. Simon Lawton has a great track record as a finance director for a number of rapidly expanding entrepreneurial businesses. Most notably, Simon worked for Tribal Group Plc and managed to help the company grow from a start-up company to a business with sales of over £250 million over the course of 10 years. Simon is a founder trustee for the Tribal Group Foundation which works to raise money and fund different health and education projects in Africa, India and Nepal. Simon spent two year working on a variety of different investment projects in Sub-Saharan Africa. These investment projects include a 5-star island tourist resort which is located in the Indian Ocean near Mozambique. In 2013, Simon worked to help co-launched a new start up support services business which is called Benula Capital Limited. This support services company works within the recruitment and HR market and currently holds a number of equity stakes in several different companies around the UK and Internationally. Benula looks to help companies carry out an accelerated growth strategy through strategic financial and development advice for owners and managers. As part of Jet Aire, Simon will be offering the Leeds based drainage contractor advice on the best ways to push the business forward. Jet Aire has been benefitting from a sustained period of growth and plans to extend further over the next five years.

Read More »

Britcon Announced That They Have Made Three New Senior Appointments

Britcon has announced that they have made three new senior appointments at their offices in Wakefield. The Building and civil engineering business has now increased their Yorkshire base team numbers to 12 with the new appointments. The Wakefield base was first opened in 2014 and over the past 12 months is has doubled its size. The first appointment to Britcon is Brian French, who has joined the company as a senior quantity surveyor. Brian French will be bringing more than 40 years’ experience as part of the building, civil engineering and fit out sectors to his new role where it is thought that he will be taking commercial responsibility for Eddie Stobart and York University initially. Brian has worked for a number of years and ha specific expertise in project cost management for private commercial sectors as well as the local authority and projects for the NHS. The second appointment to the Wakefield base is Tony Mulcrone, who will also be a site manager for the Britcon team. Mulcrone comes from a strong engineering background and it is thought that he will add value as part of the construction projects Britcon are involved in. Tony will be especially valuable when involved with construction projects that contain a great deal of emphasis on sub-structures and external works. The third appointment is Craig Bell, who has been recruited to the Britcon Engineering Services division as the structural steel 3D draftsman. Craig Bell has worked in the past for a number of Yorkshire steel fabrication firms in a number of different roles including draughtsman, buyer and estimator roles. Craig is currently working for Britcon Engineering Services on a Bulk Store project that is located IN King Lynn for ABP. Craig is also working on a project in Lancashire for Rolls Royce. These three appointments have been made to reflect Britcon’s continuous growth in Yorkshire. This growth is important due to major client instructions coming from York University, BASF, Eddie Stobart, Cepac and Bradford City Council. The company has also recently managed to secure a place as part of the contractors framework for Sheffield Teaching Hospitals Trust.

Read More »

Irwin Mitchell Announced That they Have Appointed a New Partner to Their Team

The National Law Firm Irwin Mitchell has announced that they have appointed a new partner to their National Real Estate team. It was announced that Robert Stangroom will be joining Irwin Mitchell at their Southampton office from the 8th May. In his new role Robert will be required to assist the Partner David Fanchi and work with the other nine members of the Southampton-based real estate team. The role will involve concentrating on the more general commercial real estate aspects of the work involved. Irwin Mitchell is a company that is more than 100 years old and is classed as one of the largest law firms in the UK. The firm offers both Personal and Business Legal Services to their clients. In 2015 Irwin Mitchell merged with Thomas Eggar LL, which meant that the company expanded its presence in London and in the South Est of the UK. The Law firm has also acquired MPH Solicitors which was a specialised Personal Injury specialist, and the private wealth firm Berkeley Law over the course of the past few years. Robert Stangroom is joining Irwin Mitchell from Wannops LLP. In his previous role, Robert was a partner and before this position he worked at Shoosmiths. In the Past Robert Stangroom has worked with David Fanchi at Thomas Eggar. Hopefully their previous working relationship will lead to a successful transition and flourishing relationship going forward. The Irwin Mitchell real estate practice now has more than 40 partners spread across the UK and 81 other real estate lawyers. These figure are continuing to expand as the Law firm does. There are a number of real estate teams and they are located at Irwin Mitchell’s 9 BLS offices. It is hoped that Robert will be a useful new addition as Real Estate Partner in the Southampton based office and will boost the Southampton office and their coverage across the Southern markets.

Read More »

Actavo Has Been Working to Provide Bartholomew School With a New Building

Actavo | Building Solutions has been working to provide Bartholomew School with a new building to be used as an exam ad sixth form centre. The school is located in Eynsham in Oxfordshire and has been looking at the different ways they could reduce the pressure on the school that has been caused by an increase in the number of pupils each year. Actavo | Building Solutions has been ranked as the fastest growing modular building company for the last three years. The modular building company worked with Ridge and Partners in order to deliver the new sixth form centre. The new building will offer the students more space as well as a modern learning space. The centre is a single-storey 352m² extension that includes a multi-purpose hall that can be used for study, but also has the capacity for 130 exam desks during the exam season. The hall area of the new building also contains a new acoustic partition as well as foldaway tables and trunking that has power points to allow pupils to get plugged in access for laptops and portable devices. In the building there is also a cloakroom and a kitchen, plant room cleaner’s cupboard and two staff offices as well as storage space for furniture and three unisex WCs. For this project Bartholomew School needed to accommodate the ever increasing number of pupils attracted to the school as well as keeping within the architectural heritage of the school while offering a space that would add to the learning experience of the sixth form students. It is thought that the new centre adds a fresh aspect to the older buildings of the school that surround it. Actavo were asked to create a cost effective building that can be completed quickly while keeping high standards of performance. Increasingly schools are looking to offsite construction projects in order to offer the optimum construction solution.

Read More »

Beautiful show homes now open to view at Tall Trees

Award-winning house builder Kier Living Eastern has revealed three superb show homes now available for viewing at its Tall Trees development in historic Potton. The Mayfair, an attractive four-bedroom home, the three-bedroom Bluebell and The Palmerston, also three bedrooms, give visitors a glimpse of the chance of an attractive lifestyle with spacious living areas and elegant kitchens. This impressive collection of homes is already proving popular with happy buyers already snapping them up. Kier Living Eastern’s sales and marketing director David Thomas said: “Tall Trees is a beautiful place to set up home, whether you are looking for your first house, are a growing family in need of more space or even downsizing. “I would encourage house hunters to look sooner rather than later so they do not miss out on this wonderful opportunity.” This striking collection of 31 new homes features six different property types which will offer something for everyone, and is phase one of a total 151 houses. Tall Trees is just off Biggleswade Road, close to Potton’s historic centre, which enjoys a Georgian market square, a host of independent retailers and supermarkets. Prices at Tall Trees start at £299,995 for three bedroom homes. Some properties may also be eligible for Help to Buy. Homes are available under Kier Living Eastern’s part exchange scheme, where the buyer’s existing property is given a fair offer based on independent market valuations. The initiative removes any chain from the sale, while estate agency fees can be avoided. Terms and conditions of the scheme can be found on the Kier website. To view The Mayfair, The Bluebell or The Palmerston, simply pop along to the marketing suite, which is open Wednesday to Monday from 10am to 5pm. For more information, call the sales team on 07784365760 or visit www.kierliving.co.uk. For more information about Kier Living Eastern, visit www.kierliving.co.uk

Read More »

Dunton Environmental Has Acquired a New One-acre in Northgate

Dunton Environmental is a remediation firm that is one of the leading companies for design and implementation or ground and water remediation solutions. This remediation is carried out for the purposes of land restoration. The remediation consultants have recently acquired a new one-acre site in Northgate. This site in Northgate, Aldridge includes 10,000 sq. ft. of office space that will undergo some refurbishment works. The site also holds storage yards that are used for plants and machinery. Dunton Environmental have applied technologies that are used for the treatment of contaminated soil and water as well as being able to offer expert waste management. The business offers benefits to their clients that are measurable and cost efficient. Johnson Fellows, the chartered surveyors were appointed in order to help Dunton find a site that is suitable and that met the remediation company’s requirements. Johnson Fellows is a commercial property agency that was fist established in 1984. The Chartered Surveyors practice works in a number of specialist departments and acts for a mixture of different clients which include retailers, developers, investors, financiers and occupiers of commercial property. The new site is situated north of Birmingham. Dunton’s specialist knowledge has become increasingly more popular as a reaction to the higher levels of activity within the construction industry.  While property transactions can be full of challenges, Johnson Fellows managed to help Dunton Environmental work their way through the process while also allowing Dunton to continue to work on their business. The new site in Northgate will be where Dunton Environmental relocate to in order to accommodate their increasing operations as well as allowing for more growth in the future. It is thought that the Aldridge site is the ideal place for the company to grow and expand. This site should provide Dunton Environmental an appropriate HQ in an excellent location as Dunton continue with their plans for expansion.

Read More »

Consultation on the UK Air Quality Plan Has Been Published

The consultation on the UK Air Quality Plan has been published. Matthew Pencharz has spoken out after the publishing of the Plan by the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs, or Defra. The former Deputy Mayor of London, Matthew Pencharz has said that the Government needs to do more to encourage local authorities in order to introduce and obtain the necessary powers to enforce environmental regulations on areas such as construction sites in order to promote the use of clean technologies following the Government Air Quality Plan that has been released by Defra. The Government Air Quality Plan that has been published appears to be quite unambitious, considering the construction equipment in London accounts for 7% of the emissions which leads to the high NO2 concentrations that are currently at a level which is unacceptable. These high levels of NO2 are high across the country and action needs to be taken in order to improve the air quality. However, the clean technologies that are available in this sector use batteries. These batteries can be used to supply temporary power for construction sites and events. These batteries are available in the marketplace and would lead to a significant reduction of air pollution if adopted more widely. Off Grid Energy is a company that works to save their customers thousands of pounds in fuel costs by using these clean technologies. These procedures could also reduce the pollution and noise created by construction sites. The former deputy Mayor of London has said that it is disappointing that the Defra Air Quality Plan that has been set out by the Government does not set out the reductions that the UK need to have a significant impact on the air pollution. More could be done to promote the utilization of these cleaner energy technologies that will save money as well as reduce emissions. The Air Quality Plan has previously set out regulations to start cleaning up the construction industry however in the newest publication, there was only mention of new machines being brought in to use in 2019, and no reference to any older and more polluting companies.

Read More »