Business barometer £2.2bn is won in May as councils rush to let schools before Osborne’s Budget
Ðǿմ«Ã½ Schools for the Future once again underpinned contractors’ workload in May - which will only heighten the industry’s fears that the government will take the axe to the £55bn scheme in the emergency budget on 22 June, or as part of the autumn spending review.
Bam Construct is a case in point: it climbed to the top of the table with two huge school wins worth a total of £305m: a £235m Camden BSF scheme and a £70m deal for Renfrewshire council.
Meanwhile, Carillon was helped into second place by more than £50m of education work. And Ðǿմ«Ã½ understands that next month’s table will show that Balfour Beatty won a £220m BSF contract in Derby last week, and that Interserve picked up a £150m deal in St Helens. It begs the question, just what will the table look like in 12 months’ time?
Tony Williams, an analyst at economic consultant Ðǿմ«Ã½ Value, said the wins could be the result of a rush to get projects through the door before it closes. He added: “BSF contracts will flatten out in 2011 then fall sharply in 2012.â€
It may explain why the £2.2bn of work won this May was not only better than last year (£1.4bn), it was even better than the £1.8bn let in May 2007, at the height of the boom.
In total, just over half of contract income came from the public sector, including sixth-placed Rok’s £130m Oldham council housing win. Although the total value of contracts is higher than 2007, average contract values are lower: £5.3m compared with £6.6m three years ago.
Sir Robert McAlpine bucked the public sector trend by picking up Heron Group’s Milton Court tower for £133m after a prolonged battle with Mace.
Balfour Beatty remains far ahead of its rivals on the annual rolling leaderboard, and Laing O’Rourke edged back past Kier to third place, winning £2.5bn of work over the past year despite reports that it plans to close its Middle East arm owing to a lack of work.
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