Exclusive: Bam and Kier shortlisted for both of the latest two batches of priority schools

Free schools

Bam Construct and Kier have been shortlisted for the next two batches of schools to come through the government’s flagship school building programme.

Building can reveal that the two contractors have been shortlisted for both the London batch of schools, worth around £50m and the second batch of schools in the Midlands to come to market, which is worth around £30m.

The schools are the latest batches to come to market through the £400m directly-funded part of the Priority Schools Building Programme.

The contractors were chosen from the Education Funding Agency’s contractor’s framework for the North and Midlands region and the London, the South and the South and East of England which includes big names such as Balfour Beatty, Carillion, Vinci, and Sir Robert McAlpine.

Building understands that the firms will now go into the invitation to tender stage, with the appointment of the successful contractor on each batch expected in 8-10 weeks.

The shortlisting of Bam and Kier on both of the batches comes after Bam and Sir Robert McAlpine were shortlisted on the £64m batch in the North-east of England and Bam and Wates were shortlisted on the first Midlands batch, worth around £36m.

As exclusively revealed by Building, Sir Robert McAlpine won the North-east batch, with Wates picking up the first Midlands batch.