黑洞社区

This has been a bad year for regional contractors with heritages stretching back decades.

Between them, Shaylor, 笔辞肠丑颈苍鈥檚, Simons and now Clugston had been trading for a combined period of close to 300 years. Another regional firm, Welsh contractor Dawnus, subsided in March after nearly two decades in business. All five were well-known regional firms and were more than a match for the bigger rivals who came hunting for jobs in their patch.

Clugston鈥檚 demise is another blow for the role of regional contractors, having to face down the might of larger firms.

>> Read: Clugston had 鈥榯urnaround plan in place鈥�, says finance boss

It is worth pointing out that Clugston was involved in a number of energy-from-waste schemes and these jobs have certainly tripped up several firms. Interserve, famously, but Sir Robert McAlpine and Bouygues have also taken hits on these jobs in recent years.

>> Read: Sir Robert McAlpine blames EfW jobs for 拢23m loss

These schemes are technically challenging and two years ago former Balfour Beatty executive Nick Pollard, who was then in charge of recycling firm Cory Riverside Energy, told 黑洞社区: 鈥淚f you don鈥檛 understand the risk or don鈥檛 have the people to construct that asset, don鈥檛 do it.鈥� Pollard, incidentally, is now a non-executive at Interserve.

Do family-run firms have someone outside the family who can say: 鈥淗ang on a minute, is this the right job to be taking on?鈥�

But not everything is the fault of energy-from-waste schemes. Some people must make money from them, otherwise they wouldn鈥檛 bother.

Regional players undoubtedly feel the squeeze when bigger firms start to muscle in on their territory. As work tightens elsewhere, larger firms cast their nets further afield and that can mean prices get squeezed and the smaller firms end up taking on jobs they wouldn鈥檛 normally do and at prices they can鈥檛 possibly sustain.

There is also a common denominator running through the collapse of Shaylor, 笔辞肠丑颈苍鈥檚, Simons and Clugston: all were family-run firms. An obvious question to ask is what sort of checks and balances were put in place to ensure they didn鈥檛 end up taking unnecessary risk on jobs? In short, do family-run firms have someone outside the family who can say: 鈥淗ang on a minute, is this the right job to be taking on?鈥�

Next year marks the 20th anniversary of perhaps the most famous family-run building firm hitting the skids. Laing Construction had a blue-riband set of projects on its CV 鈥� landmark schemes it worked on included the M1; it rebuilt the bomb-damaged Coventry Cathedral and it completed the Barbican Centre in London. Its roll call of industry luminaries who passed through its doors include Olympic Delivery Authority chair John Armitt, former Alfred McAlpine chief executive Oliver Whitehead and former Costain boss Stuart Doughty. But it was felled by a series of disastrous jobs 鈥� notably Cardiff鈥檚 Millennium Stadium and the National Physical Laboratory in west London.

When it was put up for sale in November 2000, Laing had initially hoped to get around 拢100m for the business. While it didn鈥檛 actually collapse, it ended up having to be rescued by one of its subcontractors 鈥� O鈥橰ourke, who paid a nominal 拢1 for a business that had 150 years of heritage.

It might be two decades ago but it remains the unfortunate benchmark for modern falls from grace 鈥� and all too familiar. In the end, it was bad jobs that did for it. 鈥楾was ever thus.

Dave Rogers, deputy editor, 黑洞社区