News

Midlands-based groundworks specialist PGC Contractors Ltd is in administration. Insolvency specialist Ninos Koumettou of Alexander Lawson Jacobs was appointed administrator on 17 July. PGC Contractors has been in operation for 18 years. According to its website, it was turning over £8-10m a year from 11 clients, including Vinci, Tolent, Kier, John Sisk and Thomas Vale. It took on a wide range of groundworks projects, including retaining walls and flood defences, as well as reinforced concrete frames up to four storeys and bridge works. Sister company Trafalgar Hire is believed to be unaffected.

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A mobile crane crashed in to a concrete barrier on London’s M25 in the UK over the weekend closing it down for a short period. The incident occurred on the orbital highway’s anti-clockwise direction between Junction eight and nine in Surrey. The crane a five axle Grove GMK250 is owned by Bronzeshield Crane Hire, fortunately no one was hurt in the incident. An investigation into what happened is underway

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An increase in house building could be on the cards in certain areas, thanks to new legislation being brought into force by the government that will give social tenants the power to boost house building in their area. Right to Transfer, which is coming into force in the autumn, will mean that tenants can take control over future investment into their communities by requesting new homes to be built. The plans will work alongside the £19.5bn public and private investment to build 170,000 affordable homes by 2015, and plans in the Spending Review to invest £3.3bn to deliver 165,000 affordable homes over 3 years from 2015 – equivalent to the fastest annual rate of housebuilding for 20 years. As part of the deal, housing associations will need to show plans in …

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Staffordshire-based bathroom products supplier Silverdale has been wound up with the loss of 26 jobs after administrators failed to find a buyer for the business. Matt Ingram, who ,last month was appointed joint administrator of the Newcastle-under-Lyme business with fellow Duff & Phelps colleague John Whitfield, said he regretted having to close the business, but said new orders had dried up since the company had gone into administration. He said: “The resulting loss of turnover meant that the business was incurring unsustainable losses, which left us with no option but to close the doors.” He said it was still possible the bathroom manufacturing could return to the site, as the infrastructure remains in place. “However, at present, we do not have anyone indicating such …

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Three top tips for improving safety in warehouses Safety should never be an afterthought, or even worse completely ignored, in a warehouse. These large facilities are filled with people every single day, not to mention all the equipment that is used, the complex tasks that go on within their walls and the vehicles that are driven around to complete deliveries. To ensure that everyone is kept out of danger and accidents are prevented wherever possible, make sure to bear these three important safety points in mind: 1.       Provide everyone with adequate safety equipment There are so many tasks that go on inside a typical warehouse where safety equipment is essential. Anyone who is working with loud machinery must protect their ears from permanent damage, while eyewear is …

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Specialist air conditioning hire firm, Andrews Sykes, has responded to MPs’ Early Day Motion to introduce a new law for maximum temperatures in the workplace.

According to Andrew Sykes, while Linda Riordan, MP for Calderdale, is right to raise the issue of workplace temperature, her approach in pushing for a law requiring bosses to send staff home if workplaces get hotter than 30°C puts unreasonable pressure on hard pressed businesses.

Stewart Owen, marketing manager at Andrews Sykes, said: “If MPs’ objective is to pressurise employers in to providing decent, appropriate and comfortable working environments in order to prevent mass walkouts, it certainly has merit. But a more workable solution is to initially provide a set of industry-specific guidelines, allowing employers the opportunity to put measures in place to make the workplace a more tolerable temperature.”

He continued: “Excessive heat is of course dangerous and every effort should be made to control the indoor climate during a heatwave, but we have reservations that this motion has not been adequately considered.

“In today’s economic climate, it is simply not feasible to even consider allowing workers to down tools and of course there are industries where that’s just not possible.

“This plan contains practical guidelines to ensure organisations remain operational even in extreme conditions. We have absolute sympathy for anyone working in unreasonable conditions but mass walkouts are surely not reasonable, practical or sustainable in the long term,” he concluded.

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 Hire Jungle

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Property website Rightmove has raised its forecast for annual British home price growth after housing witnessed a seventh consecutive month of price increases in July.

Rightmove expects 4% growth in house prices in 2013, up from the previous forecast for a 2% growth, as the sector experiences a broader-based recovery fuelled by the ‘aggregation of marginal gains’.

The website added that asking prices increased 0.3% on month in July to £253,658 ($383,024, €293,090). From the year-ago month, home asking prices increased by 4.8%, with all regions’ prices increasing for the first time in nearly three years.

“The market is currently benefitting from the ‘aggregation of marginal gains’ where incremental improvements across a range of market drivers help to slowly but surely build momentum,” Miles Shipside, Rightmove director said in a statement.

“Rightmove’s lead indicators show increasing enquiries to agents and developers, new sellers and marketing prices. An important signal for a broader-based and sustainable recovery is that all regions of the country now have higher prices than a year ago”.

Consumer confidence has also increased as the number of home-movers, anticipating average prices to be higher in next 12 months, has increased to 62% from 31% a year ago.

On the demand side, the number of transactions on Rightmove website increased by 5% in the year-to-date period. Meanwhile, email enquiries to agents and developers increased by 18% on 2012, as the surveyors are “struggling to cope” with demand.

The improvement also underlines HMRC’s recent data saying house transactions increased by 5% on 2012 and the Bank of England’s figures for mortgage approvals that are up 6% on last year.

Funding for Lending and Help to Buy

Rightmove added that the current borrowing environment is boosted by governmental measures, such as the Funding for Lending Scheme (FLS) and the Help to Buy Scheme.

The FLS has eased mortgage rates and increased loan availability while the Help to Buy, currently available for new build only, is capturing prospective buyers’ interest.

Last year, the Bank of England launched the FLS that helped banks to provide loans at lower interest rates to businesses and individuals.

In addition, the government’s Help to Buy Scheme, launched earlier this year, has helped first-time buyers with eased mortgage rules. The number of loans given to first-time buyers increased by 41.8% year-on-year to 25,100 in May,the Council of Mortgage Lenders reported earlier.

“The ability to borrow is increasing as the Funding for Lending Scheme starts to really deliver, though it still favours those with better deposits. Lenders are squeezing their margins and, with the prospect of no base rate rise for three years, consumers are increasingly aware of moving options rather than debt burden,” Shipside added.

“The Help to Buy scheme, the centre-piece of the last Budget, has already created a marked upturn in the new-build market as recently reported in some developers’ trading updates.”

In addition, markets do not expect an increase in base rate until the latter half of 2016, said the property website.

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E.ON is urging all UK energy providers to support its call for an industry-wide end to the process of automatically renewing fixed term contracts for small businesses. 

A consultation with customers found that 86 per cent of our small business customers would prefer to negotiate a new contract or move to a more flexible agreement rather than automatically being ‘rolled’ on to a new long-term fixed deal1 which is currently standard practice across the industry.

E.ON’s call – submitted to industry regulator Ofgem – follows major improvements in how the company works with its small and medium-sized business customers; including contract end dates on customer bills, a fair negotiation policy for customers who have missed their renewal window, a commitment to a maximum one-year period for backdated bills and helping to set up an independent code of practice for business energy sales.

These initiatives have been well received by customers with complaints well down and higher levels of engagement and negotiation.

Anthony Ainsworth, Sales and Marketing Director of E.ON UK, said: “The message from small businesses is clear; they want greater simplicity, straight-talking and fair play.

“We know from our own business customer panel and from independent research that the majority of small businesses just don’t like the automatic rollover process and find it too complex which is why we are urging the industry to work together to make things simple and more straightforward.

“If this is going to work the industry and the regulator have to work together and create a level playing field, offering clarity, consistency and simplicity for customers. For any one supplier to act alone risks layering greater complexity on to an already confusing situation.”

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