UK Construction and Law
A Teesside construction group adds a Darlington groundworker and its drainage company
By Staff Writer | 6 September 2026
Hughes Bros Construction and JIG have joined a nine company group that puts its combined annual turnover at 160m pounds. Both keep their own names, and the board change at the acquired company was registered a week before the announcement.
The Middlesbrough based Applebridge group announced on 4 September 2026 that Hughes Bros Construction and its sister drainage business have joined it. On its own account the group now covers nine construction companies working in the residential, commercial and multi utility sectors, spanning ground investigation, earthworks, plant hire, groundworks, civil engineering, multi utilities, retaining wall solutions, building services and road surfacing, with a combined annual turnover of 160m pounds, up from 100m pounds in 2023.
What has been bought
Hughes Bros Construction Limited, company number 05635308, was incorporated on 24 November 2005 and is registered at Middleton St George near Darlington. The group describes it as a contractor of more than 30 years' experience in the housebuilding sector across the North East and Yorkshire, working for national developers. The drainage business is registered as JIG UK Drainage Solutions Ltd, company number 13677602, incorporated on 13 October 2021 at the same Darlington address, and offers drain clearing, closed circuit television surveys, resin patch repairs, sewer maintenance and drainage infrastructure work.
Both businesses are to continue operating under their existing names.
Over the last 30 years, we have built strong businesses, trusted client relationships and an excellent reputation within our sectors, and becoming part of the wider Group creates a fantastic platform for future growth.
Gary Hughes, a director of Hughes Bros Construction Limited
The register tells the timing
Companies House records a board change at Hughes Bros Construction Limited on 26 August 2026, a week before the announcement. A new director was appointed whose correspondence address is Hughes House, Cargo Fleet Road, Middlesbrough, the acquiring group's registered office, and another director's appointment was terminated on the same date. Both forms were filed on 27 August 2026.
The company also filed full accounts made up to 30 November 2025 on 18 August 2026. Figures for turnover and profit have been reported in the trade press; they are not repeated here because they have not been checked against the filed accounts.
Why a groundworker and a drainage arm go together
The pairing is the point rather than the size. Earthworks and site preparation for a housing scheme end at the same place the drainage begins, and the interface between them is where programme is lost: a plot cannot be built until the levels are right, and the levels cannot be signed off until the below ground drainage is in and tested. Where the two are contracted separately, the delay claim tends to sit on the boundary between them, with each contractor pointing at the other's sequence.
Holding both inside one group does not remove that risk, because the contracts are still separate and the developer still has two points of contact unless it chooses otherwise. What it does is give the group a single management line across the boundary, and the ability to price the two packages against one another when a scheme is tendered. Whether that turns into a commercial advantage depends on whether the developers who use the groundworker are willing to let the drainage follow.
For the wider market, the read is that consolidation in the North East is still running through the specialist trades rather than the main contractors. A group that has moved from 100m pounds to 160m pounds of turnover in three years is buying capability at the bottom of the housing cycle, on the assumption that housing output recovers before the cost of carrying it does.