THE Morgan Sindall Group – which is involved in many major public projects locally – has seen orders rise.

The group, whose construction subsidiary Morgan Sindall has offices in Cabot Lane, Poole, saw operating profit before exceptional items fall two per cent to £15.2m, according to its half-year results.

Its order book stood at £2.7bn, up 14 per cent on the previous year-end, supported by a £3.2bn pipeline of regeneration schemes.

Adjusted earnings per share were down from 31.5p to 28.6p, while the interim dividend stayed at 12p.

Current and recent contracts for Morgan Sindall’s Poole office include: n Two projects with the Arts University Bournemouth – a £3.5m, four-storey extension to the photography department and £2m worth of new buildings for the student services, student union and facilities management departments.

  •  £27m of work for a £40m regeneration scheme in Bournemouth – an £18m contract to build three blocks of accommodation for the Arts University Bournemouth and a £9m contract for a five-storey block of apartments at Leyton Mount.
  •  A £5.8m warehouse and industrial radiographic cell for Heatric in Poole, for testing the heat exchangers produced at the plan.
  •  Completion of a £1.5m extension to turn the former Heatherlands First School in Parkstone into Heatherlands Primary.
  • A £2.2m contract to renovate and extend a sports hall at Thomas Hardye School in Dorchester.
  •  A £2m refurbishment and extension of the grade II listed Christchurch library.

The Poole office also led the bid to secure Morgan Sindall’s appointment to Construction Framework South West, a programme covering a wide range of public sector building projects in the region.