Author Archives: Matthew Davies

There were 24,590 new construction apprentices taken on in 2024/25, the first annual rise in three years, according to a report from professional tool supplier Protrade. At the same time, it was a record year for women beginning apprenticeships in the sector, with a 9 per cent rise on the…

Analysts are upgrading their profit predictions for Morgan Sindall after the firm issued an unscheduled trading update due to its fit-out division outperforming expectations. Under Article 17 of the Market Abuse Regulations, companies must disclose information directly concerning themselves to the stock market as soon as possible so that the…

The construction of a new substation in Orkney will help bring 220 megawatts of renewable energy from across the North Sea to the British mainland

A third of the UK’s listed construction companies issued profit warnings last year, with project delays and cancellations among the main reasons, according to a new report. EY-Parthenon’s latest Profit Warnings study shows the 36 firms in the FTSE Construction and Materials sector issued 18 profit warnings between them last…

Construction activity in the final quarter of last year remained subdued, although infrastructure and public housing workloads saw some improvement, according to the latest Construction Monitor from the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS). Overall workloads barely moved in Q4 of 2025, with the headline net balance marginally improving from…

Scottish contracting and civil engineering firm RJ McLeod has reported improved turnover, pre-tax profit and margin, nearly 20 months after its acquisition by OCU Group. The Glasgow-based firm lengthened its accounting period from 30 October 2024 to 29 April 2025 to align with other OCU Group companies. It increased its…

A year after a court granted the first order extending defects liability to a parent company, what lessons have been learned by claimants, contractors and the legal profession? 

The line “All this must change” in American writer Henry Longfellow’s poem Kéramos is certainly apt for the future of regulation and oversight in construction. This year is a time of transition for the Building Safety Regulator (BSR). By the end of January 2027, it will have emerged from under…

Danny Nelson, board member and managing director at Winvic, says data centres will form a fourth pillar of his firm’s strategy

Total output in the UK construction sector fell 1.1 per cent in the three months to November last year, compared with the previous three-month period. According to the Office for National Statistics (ONS), the decrease was the largest quarterly drop since March 2023, when it went down by 1.4 per…