L&G shuts modular housing manufacturing facility with lack of 450 jobs

Legal & General (L&G), the FTSE 100 asset administration and pensions large, is to shut its modular housebuilding manufacturing facility, in a transfer which is able to put 450 jobs in danger and solid doubts over the way forward for a supposedly pioneering sector.

Sky News has learnt the corporate knowledgeable employees at its web site in Selby, Yorkshire, that it intends to cease producing there following years of weak demand.

Sources mentioned the COVID-19 pandemic and planning delays had been main components within the incapacity of the unit to ship enough orders to grow to be worthwhile.

L&G established the modular housing arm seven years in the past, constructing a manufacturing facility with the capability to assemble 3,000 modular houses annually.

Although particular gross sales figures for the division are unclear, insiders mentioned it had considerably underperformed expectations.

It will full current orders to make sure supply, they added.

The choice shall be seen as a major blow to a section of the housing market which was alleged to make developing houses cheaper and sooner.

L&G had established the enterprise as a part of a self-proclaimed mission to make “housing fairer for all” throughout a interval of intense scrutiny of the sector and authorities housebuilding targets.

In an announcement issued in response to an enquiry from Sky News, L&G mentioned: “Legal & General has introduced at this time that it’s proposing to cut back enterprise exercise and stop new modular manufacturing at its Modular Housing Factory in Selby, Yorkshire, while reviewing and assessing potential strategic choices for the enterprise.

“As a start-up business with a significant fixed cost base, a strong and predictable site pipeline is required to make L&G Modular Homes a successful sustainable business.

“As a part of its ambitions to tackling the housing disaster, Legal & General Modular Homes constructed a big manufacturing facility to ship impactful housing volumes, nevertheless, with this comes vital operating prices making it important to have a dependable pipeline.

“These factors, coupled with long planning delays in the UK and recent major macro events such as COVID, have meant the business has not been able to secure the necessary scale of pipeline to make the current model work.”

The firm added that it was “commencing consultation with all employees around the proposal to make the majority of Modular Homes roles redundant”.

“The business will be doing all that it can to support employees during this difficult time and will be actively exploring opportunities for redeployment.”

Media experiences final autumn steered that L&G had accrued losses of near £175m for the reason that modular housing enterprise was arrange.

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One particular person near L&G contrasted the travails of the modular housing arm with its wider housebuilding presence.

Through CALA, an L&G subsidiary, and its reasonably priced houses arm, it has constructed 15,000 houses over the past three years.

It is concentrating on an extra 15,000 through the subsequent three years.

CALA’s revenues grew from about £250m to £1.25bn beneath L&G’s possession, based on the supply.

The closure of its Selby manufacturing facility comes as L&G prepares to call a successor to Sir Nigel Wilson, the long-serving chief government, who has pivoted the group in direction of huge investments in areas akin to city regeneration and social housing.