Mears grabs £100m of Connaught jobs

Social housing contractor Mears has picked up four former Connaught contracts potentially worth more than £100m, it said today.

Mears, which has previously said it had taken on an undisclosed number of contracts for a “nominal” sum, said today that it had gained a £48m contract for capital and cyclical works with Islington ALMO Homes for Islington, a decent homes contract for the London Borough of Lambeth, and two contracts with Exeter city council worth up to £20.5m.

The four-year Homes for Islington job could be extended to a decade, a move which would increase its value to £120m.

Mears said it remained in discussion with a number of other former Connaught customers. The news came in a trading update from the firm, in which it said its social housing revenue growth was likely to be marginally below expectations, but that it had outperformed expectations in terms of winning new work.

This includes a £300m ten-year job for housing association Family Mosaic to provide a 24-hour call centre, responsive repairs and estate management services.

It will also incur an unexpected £0.6m bill for mobilisation costs related to these new contract wins.

In total the firm’s bid pipeline is in excess of £3bn, with the order book standing at £2.6bn. It said 95% of consensus forecast revenues had been secured for 2010, with 90% secured for 2011 and 75% for 2012.

The firm said that the outcome of the comprehensive spending review would be positive for the firm as it would continue to drive outsourcing by local authorities.